i hope that this government gains a little perspective and pulls back before this becomes an albatross for them.
we are not taking the right position on this; we're just embarrassing ourselves, in a rush to contain the chinese.
Sunday, September 6, 2020
so, is the cfr a better or worse source than the atlantic? i don't know. that's a pretty daunting insult directed at the atlantic...
if this is the way things are, that is good, as it's also how things ought to be.
again: there's ways to sort of try to blunt the effects on bangladesh by trying to scatter them around a little - to pakistan, to the middle east and, in some small numbers, perhaps to canada, as well.
but, that line was drawn to give the buddhists in the former empire a homeland of their own, and the muslims don't get to encroach on it just because they overbred. they don't get lebensraum by default, just because they're muslims, or because they're brown.
they need to get their population levels under control, not argue that overpopulation gives them some kind of right to spill over into neighbouring regions. and, whatever the solution to easing the existing issues are, they should come with the acceptance that the country was partitioned for a reason, and muslims need to stay out of the buddhist regions.
....at least for now. we don't talk like that on this side of the world, but it's because we've reached a different cultural plateau. and, some level of atheism in the region, an inevitable consequence of higher standards of living, is likely the way to get to a more substantive level of peace.
for now, these religious groups don't like each other, and their various autonomy needs to be respected.
i'd say the same thing if you flipped the situation over.
https://www.cfr.org/blog/what-happens-if-rohingya-stay-bangladesh-forever
if this is the way things are, that is good, as it's also how things ought to be.
again: there's ways to sort of try to blunt the effects on bangladesh by trying to scatter them around a little - to pakistan, to the middle east and, in some small numbers, perhaps to canada, as well.
but, that line was drawn to give the buddhists in the former empire a homeland of their own, and the muslims don't get to encroach on it just because they overbred. they don't get lebensraum by default, just because they're muslims, or because they're brown.
they need to get their population levels under control, not argue that overpopulation gives them some kind of right to spill over into neighbouring regions. and, whatever the solution to easing the existing issues are, they should come with the acceptance that the country was partitioned for a reason, and muslims need to stay out of the buddhist regions.
....at least for now. we don't talk like that on this side of the world, but it's because we've reached a different cultural plateau. and, some level of atheism in the region, an inevitable consequence of higher standards of living, is likely the way to get to a more substantive level of peace.
for now, these religious groups don't like each other, and their various autonomy needs to be respected.
i'd say the same thing if you flipped the situation over.
https://www.cfr.org/blog/what-happens-if-rohingya-stay-bangladesh-forever
i just got out of the shower and had a random urge for a fruit drink i used to consume large amounts of when i was a kid.
i was a big fan of this film when i was very small, and used to run and around screaming...number 5 is alive...number 5...is....alive....
input.
need.
innnnnpppuuuuuut.
you can imagine that it was both exceedingly cute and incredibly irritating at the same time.
so, you can imagine how i reacted the first time my dad dropped this on me, as a tongue-in-cheek joke:
i haven't had any in years; it just snuck up on me, for no real reason, besides maybe that i'm thirsty.
but, i remember it being a little watery the last time i had one, too.
i was a big fan of this film when i was very small, and used to run and around screaming...number 5 is alive...number 5...is....alive....
input.
need.
innnnnpppuuuuuut.
you can imagine that it was both exceedingly cute and incredibly irritating at the same time.
so, you can imagine how i reacted the first time my dad dropped this on me, as a tongue-in-cheek joke:
but, i remember it being a little watery the last time i had one, too.
i would support a move away from the disastrous & murderous monroe doctrine and a re-embrace of the good neighbour policy, which is quite a few steps to the left of biden (as usual).
but, i'm not sure that cuban-americans are going to agree with me about that.
https://www.nbcnews.com/news/latino/biden-slams-trump-abject-failure-venezuela-well-cuba-policies-n1239356
but, i'm not sure that cuban-americans are going to agree with me about that.
https://www.nbcnews.com/news/latino/biden-slams-trump-abject-failure-venezuela-well-cuba-policies-n1239356
no, listen: i'm firm on this. anybody arguing that myanmar should carve out an islamic state on it's border are on the wrong side of history, here. the burmese have the right to self-determination, and the right to defend their borders.
but, let's take a step back and remember how the region became the way it did, and why it became the way it did, as well.
so, this is a history lesson post...
most people know the british were in india until gandhi threw them out (i'm being facetiously simple). but, let's remember what the map of british india looked like:
british india, of which the british monarch declared itself emperor (and emperess as it may be), was not merely what we today think of as "india", but also included:
1) pakistan
2) bangladesh
3) burma (now called myanmar)
4) nepal
5) bhutan
this is a huge area, with a very large number of people in it.
even back then, the british fought conflicts in afghanistan against the russians and iranians, in an attempt to expand influence into central asia and cut off the russians from the indian ocean - which the chinese are attempting to gain access to through myanmar, today.
when the country was partitioned in 1948, it was very purposefully split into three regions, as demonstrated by the following map:
the partitions were as follows:
1) green is muslim
2) orange is hindu
3) blue is buddhist
now, there are still muslims in india and burma, it is true, but the reason it was partitioned this way was to give primacy to specific religious groups in the various areas.
so, when the country of canada walks into this space and starts undoing the partition, and trying to bully the burmese into opening up an extra space for muslims, they should rightfully be seen as an imperial agent trying to reassert the primacy of british colonialism.
an area for muslims was already cut out - it's the green area. and, if muslims in the blue area want self-determinancy, they should move to the green areas.
but, let's take a step back and remember how the region became the way it did, and why it became the way it did, as well.
so, this is a history lesson post...
most people know the british were in india until gandhi threw them out (i'm being facetiously simple). but, let's remember what the map of british india looked like:
british india, of which the british monarch declared itself emperor (and emperess as it may be), was not merely what we today think of as "india", but also included:
1) pakistan
2) bangladesh
3) burma (now called myanmar)
4) nepal
5) bhutan
this is a huge area, with a very large number of people in it.
even back then, the british fought conflicts in afghanistan against the russians and iranians, in an attempt to expand influence into central asia and cut off the russians from the indian ocean - which the chinese are attempting to gain access to through myanmar, today.
when the country was partitioned in 1948, it was very purposefully split into three regions, as demonstrated by the following map:
the partitions were as follows:
1) green is muslim
2) orange is hindu
3) blue is buddhist
now, there are still muslims in india and burma, it is true, but the reason it was partitioned this way was to give primacy to specific religious groups in the various areas.
so, when the country of canada walks into this space and starts undoing the partition, and trying to bully the burmese into opening up an extra space for muslims, they should rightfully be seen as an imperial agent trying to reassert the primacy of british colonialism.
an area for muslims was already cut out - it's the green area. and, if muslims in the blue area want self-determinancy, they should move to the green areas.
myanmar was lost to the chinese fifty years ago.
and, we have no business there, and never did - not even to back continued arab colonization in the region.
https://thediplomat.com/2020/01/has-the-us-lost-myanmar-to-china/
and, we have no business there, and never did - not even to back continued arab colonization in the region.
https://thediplomat.com/2020/01/has-the-us-lost-myanmar-to-china/
there's even an angle with the gambia thing, regarding the struggle between the west and the chinese for control of resource extraction in africa, although the gambians seem to be playing both sides.
there's a link to a video in here somewhere where obama stands in front of a group of african emissaries and states, without blinking, that america does not intend to steal or extract resources from africa. it's perhaps one of the funniest things i've ever seen.
there's a link to a video in here somewhere where obama stands in front of a group of african emissaries and states, without blinking, that america does not intend to steal or extract resources from africa. it's perhaps one of the funniest things i've ever seen.
again: the atlantic is not a very good source, but they get the basic point, here.
islam is a violent system of brutal colonization, and it's quite understandable that myanmar is beyond apprehensive about opening the doors - it knows that they will take over, if they'e allowed to, and no educated person can really dispute the point, everybody realizes that truth. so, the indigenous burmese have an absolute right to protect themselves from muslim colonization in the form of bangladeshi encroachment into the region. that's not an act of repression; that's self-defence.
but, you have to work in the various alliances here, as well. while there was some thought that this aung san suu kyi character may provide an opening for the west in myanmar, the country in truth remains under a chinese-backed military dictatorship, which she is mostly playing ball with. so, western support for this group has the effect of destabilizing myanmar for western geostrategic gains, and the canadian intervention may be seen as something less than altruistic when interpreted that way - it's more like we're brown-nosing the cia, which is consistent with the turn we've taken under freeland's foreign policy direction. human rights are just an excuse to curry american favour.
but, i don't think that's our ultimate angle. while everybody else in the world is concerned about overpopulation and carrying capacities, we seem to delusionally want to increase our population levels by bringing in anybody we can. we don't seem to have learned the lesson of ellis island, or the extreme levels of poverty and inequality that such a policy produces. you give us your huddled masses, and they starve here instead; we don't have the infrastructure to be the world's dumping ground.
but, powerful people at the top of our hierarchy want us to be, in conjunction with arab blood money.
my request is that you educate yourself on the topic before you sprout the propaganda that ultimately comes from arab oil sheikhs and bankers pushing for colonization by rohingyas as a way to muslimify the region, at the end of the day - and that we support to contain the chinese, to curry american favour. you may find that the truth is not quite what it seems.
but, we should step back if we're a hindrance to the progress of getting these people a state in the end, even if that state should not be in the geographic area called myanmar.
https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2017/09/rohingyas-burma/540513/
islam is a violent system of brutal colonization, and it's quite understandable that myanmar is beyond apprehensive about opening the doors - it knows that they will take over, if they'e allowed to, and no educated person can really dispute the point, everybody realizes that truth. so, the indigenous burmese have an absolute right to protect themselves from muslim colonization in the form of bangladeshi encroachment into the region. that's not an act of repression; that's self-defence.
but, you have to work in the various alliances here, as well. while there was some thought that this aung san suu kyi character may provide an opening for the west in myanmar, the country in truth remains under a chinese-backed military dictatorship, which she is mostly playing ball with. so, western support for this group has the effect of destabilizing myanmar for western geostrategic gains, and the canadian intervention may be seen as something less than altruistic when interpreted that way - it's more like we're brown-nosing the cia, which is consistent with the turn we've taken under freeland's foreign policy direction. human rights are just an excuse to curry american favour.
but, i don't think that's our ultimate angle. while everybody else in the world is concerned about overpopulation and carrying capacities, we seem to delusionally want to increase our population levels by bringing in anybody we can. we don't seem to have learned the lesson of ellis island, or the extreme levels of poverty and inequality that such a policy produces. you give us your huddled masses, and they starve here instead; we don't have the infrastructure to be the world's dumping ground.
but, powerful people at the top of our hierarchy want us to be, in conjunction with arab blood money.
my request is that you educate yourself on the topic before you sprout the propaganda that ultimately comes from arab oil sheikhs and bankers pushing for colonization by rohingyas as a way to muslimify the region, at the end of the day - and that we support to contain the chinese, to curry american favour. you may find that the truth is not quite what it seems.
but, we should step back if we're a hindrance to the progress of getting these people a state in the end, even if that state should not be in the geographic area called myanmar.
https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2017/09/rohingyas-burma/540513/
but, if involving ourselves slows the process down, it's self-serving and should be resisted.
i don't know what you do in this situation. the countries around them don't want them for various reasons, and (unlike canada, which is a colonial state) myanmar does have some self-determinancy in the matter; there's no valid reason why they ought to be forced to integrate a large group of foreign refugees that are not indigenous to the region and that they don't want, and there's valid accusations of continuing colonialism underlying demands by a country like canada that they should.
it's really the bangladeshis that deserve the higher levels of criticism here for kicking out their own, not myanmar that deserves the criticism for refusing them entry. some kind of proper solution really involves working with the bangladeshis to integrate the kind of population that the country was created to absorb, not pushing continuing muslim and indian colonization of what is a buddhist and ethnically different territory.
perhaps the pakistanis could offer them asylum.
but, if canada's ultimate angle here is that it sees them as a source of migration, then it should just start lifting them out and stop interfering in a legal process that it's just making worse by meddling in.
https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/canada-myanmar-court-intervention-1.5714246
i don't know what you do in this situation. the countries around them don't want them for various reasons, and (unlike canada, which is a colonial state) myanmar does have some self-determinancy in the matter; there's no valid reason why they ought to be forced to integrate a large group of foreign refugees that are not indigenous to the region and that they don't want, and there's valid accusations of continuing colonialism underlying demands by a country like canada that they should.
it's really the bangladeshis that deserve the higher levels of criticism here for kicking out their own, not myanmar that deserves the criticism for refusing them entry. some kind of proper solution really involves working with the bangladeshis to integrate the kind of population that the country was created to absorb, not pushing continuing muslim and indian colonization of what is a buddhist and ethnically different territory.
perhaps the pakistanis could offer them asylum.
but, if canada's ultimate angle here is that it sees them as a source of migration, then it should just start lifting them out and stop interfering in a legal process that it's just making worse by meddling in.
https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/canada-myanmar-court-intervention-1.5714246
yeah, i'd be more likely to blame it on the instruments being contaminated.
https://www.ctvnews.ca/sci-tech/it-shouldn-t-exist-rust-found-on-the-moon-puzzles-scientists-1.5093822
https://www.ctvnews.ca/sci-tech/it-shouldn-t-exist-rust-found-on-the-moon-puzzles-scientists-1.5093822
and, no, i don't want to run for office.
i decided i didn't want to be a scientist anymore because i found the formality of the writing too stifling; i wanted more space to express myself, and realized i'd prefer creative writing to technical writing. it just wasn't for me - i wouldn't be happy if i walked down that path, i'd just feel stifled and wasted and end up going postal.
likewise, i'd prefer to criticize the government than participate in it.
and, you can call me names for that preference if you want, but the world needs critics and outsiders in it, too; not everybody can be an actor, some people need to stand outside and dissent from a healthy distance.
you may find me frustrating, but that means what i'm doing is working; i'm a net benefit to democracy, and the world would be worse off without me.
i decided i didn't want to be a scientist anymore because i found the formality of the writing too stifling; i wanted more space to express myself, and realized i'd prefer creative writing to technical writing. it just wasn't for me - i wouldn't be happy if i walked down that path, i'd just feel stifled and wasted and end up going postal.
likewise, i'd prefer to criticize the government than participate in it.
and, you can call me names for that preference if you want, but the world needs critics and outsiders in it, too; not everybody can be an actor, some people need to stand outside and dissent from a healthy distance.
you may find me frustrating, but that means what i'm doing is working; i'm a net benefit to democracy, and the world would be worse off without me.
if i were driven by profit, i wouldn't live on odsp in some stranger's basement, and spend my entire existence in my own head, trying to evade the world and existence as much as i can. i'm highly educated. if i were driven by money, i'd go out and get it.
i'm not.
i'm driven by freedom, by ideas and by ideals, not by slavery to markets, or corruption by dollars.
i'm not.
i'm driven by freedom, by ideas and by ideals, not by slavery to markets, or corruption by dollars.
why do i do this, then?
because i'm an activist, a leftist, a socialist.
i write about the world the way i see it, and the way i want it to be, out of altruism and a legitimate desire for change - and also for public education, to undo the lies pushed by corporate media.
i'm a "true believer" if you will.
you can keep your dirty ad revenue, i don't want it.
because i'm an activist, a leftist, a socialist.
i write about the world the way i see it, and the way i want it to be, out of altruism and a legitimate desire for change - and also for public education, to undo the lies pushed by corporate media.
i'm a "true believer" if you will.
you can keep your dirty ad revenue, i don't want it.
to clarify a point, though...
there are zero ads on this page, anywhere.
i don't even have an adsense account in my name. at all.
i have made a total of $0.00 by posting to this blog, and google has actually been on my ass about paying them for hosting fees for my appspot site, although they haven't extracted anything yet.
so, i do not have a profit motive in posting here, i do not make any money by posting here and i do not have any money to give to journalists, because i'm not making anything from it. nor is google making anything off of this blog, although they may be making money off of other blogs.
so, if you want to force me to hand over some percentage of $0.00 worth of advertising revenue, i can write you a check for x% of 0 if you really insist.
i will admit that i'm drawing attention to myself, but the product for sale is at bandcamp and is music, it is not ad revenue and not available here.
and, i wish i could say that i sold a lot of downloads, but i just don't. it's actually been years since i made a transaction.
and, why are there no ads here? the reason is that i'm ideologically opposed to the model. you've seen idiocracy by now. i don't want to live in a world where people exchange access to services in exchange for corporate brainwashing, and i'm actually on the side of people that want to restrict or eliminate that. i run ad blockers, and don't want dirty ad money.
i would actually like to see the government, itself, provide some open space for writing. we should all be allowed 50 gb of online space, or something, ad free, and to do what we will with, as a birthright, or a privilege of citizenship. that would put speech enforcement directly at the hands of government, and eliminate a profit revenue from anybody posting.
the internet is not currently a public square, but i wish it was, and would support reforms to make it one - because that would increase speech rights, not diminish them.
there are zero ads on this page, anywhere.
i don't even have an adsense account in my name. at all.
i have made a total of $0.00 by posting to this blog, and google has actually been on my ass about paying them for hosting fees for my appspot site, although they haven't extracted anything yet.
so, i do not have a profit motive in posting here, i do not make any money by posting here and i do not have any money to give to journalists, because i'm not making anything from it. nor is google making anything off of this blog, although they may be making money off of other blogs.
so, if you want to force me to hand over some percentage of $0.00 worth of advertising revenue, i can write you a check for x% of 0 if you really insist.
i will admit that i'm drawing attention to myself, but the product for sale is at bandcamp and is music, it is not ad revenue and not available here.
and, i wish i could say that i sold a lot of downloads, but i just don't. it's actually been years since i made a transaction.
and, why are there no ads here? the reason is that i'm ideologically opposed to the model. you've seen idiocracy by now. i don't want to live in a world where people exchange access to services in exchange for corporate brainwashing, and i'm actually on the side of people that want to restrict or eliminate that. i run ad blockers, and don't want dirty ad money.
i would actually like to see the government, itself, provide some open space for writing. we should all be allowed 50 gb of online space, or something, ad free, and to do what we will with, as a birthright, or a privilege of citizenship. that would put speech enforcement directly at the hands of government, and eliminate a profit revenue from anybody posting.
the internet is not currently a public square, but i wish it was, and would support reforms to make it one - because that would increase speech rights, not diminish them.
see, and that's the thing, right?
some nazi bureaucrat working for the banking clique that runs the liberal party, or some corporate fascist working at some social media firm, or even some ignorant journalist with their head in their ass, may insist on shutting me down.
but, that's really just their opinion, and i'm absolutely confident they're legally wrong, so long as the issue is up to the courts to work out.
if you let the corporation make the choice, i have no speech rights. this is their server. it's their platform. i use the service at their privilege, and i can (and will.) go rant somewhere else if they don't like it.
but, if you let the courts make the choice, i have way more rights than any of those fascists want to grant me.
so, i would rather go to court than leave it up to the corporations - i know what system will uphold my rights, and what system won't.
some nazi bureaucrat working for the banking clique that runs the liberal party, or some corporate fascist working at some social media firm, or even some ignorant journalist with their head in their ass, may insist on shutting me down.
but, that's really just their opinion, and i'm absolutely confident they're legally wrong, so long as the issue is up to the courts to work out.
if you let the corporation make the choice, i have no speech rights. this is their server. it's their platform. i use the service at their privilege, and i can (and will.) go rant somewhere else if they don't like it.
but, if you let the courts make the choice, i have way more rights than any of those fascists want to grant me.
so, i would rather go to court than leave it up to the corporations - i know what system will uphold my rights, and what system won't.
do i think there's anything wrong with what i'm posting here?
no.
i'd say this to biden's face if i could, and hope he cries when i did; it's clear that i don't like him very much, and am not concerned about his feelings. and, i think he deserves what i'm posting here.
there's nothing here that's off-limits, nothing that breaks any laws, nothing that would be prosecuted as harassment, nothing that would qualify as hate.
so, bring it on - let's get the courts to strengthen speech protections, and the snowflakes to shut the fuck up.
no.
i'd say this to biden's face if i could, and hope he cries when i did; it's clear that i don't like him very much, and am not concerned about his feelings. and, i think he deserves what i'm posting here.
there's nothing here that's off-limits, nothing that breaks any laws, nothing that would be prosecuted as harassment, nothing that would qualify as hate.
so, bring it on - let's get the courts to strengthen speech protections, and the snowflakes to shut the fuck up.
ok, but what i want is a right to appeal those decisions in court.
that's what is wrong with the existing system - there is no legal process underlying it.
so, if we're going to bring in a legal process, that means we need things like court injunctions to limit rulings by bureaucrats, appeal mechanisms, etc.
i am confident that the courts would undo most of what the fake liberal government fascists and nazi snowflakes want to impose, not uphold it. so, i welcome more legal involvement as a way to increase speech rights.
if they don't do this right, they're going to end up with a series of charter challenges that will ultimately undo any unconstitutional restrictions, and they'll need to do it right, in the end.
https://globalnews.ca/news/7316532/facebook-regulation-canada-steven-guilbeault/
that's what is wrong with the existing system - there is no legal process underlying it.
so, if we're going to bring in a legal process, that means we need things like court injunctions to limit rulings by bureaucrats, appeal mechanisms, etc.
i am confident that the courts would undo most of what the fake liberal government fascists and nazi snowflakes want to impose, not uphold it. so, i welcome more legal involvement as a way to increase speech rights.
if they don't do this right, they're going to end up with a series of charter challenges that will ultimately undo any unconstitutional restrictions, and they'll need to do it right, in the end.
https://globalnews.ca/news/7316532/facebook-regulation-canada-steven-guilbeault/
when you pick up a loaf of pumpernickel, and check the side, it looks like this:
where are the b vitamins?
the answer is that they're in there in theory, but they aren't regulated. so, you don't really know. it doesn't say there aren't b vitamins, like it does for c and a. but, there's no actual meaningful evidence that your whole grain bread has any vitamins in it at all - it's something you have to take on empty faith. i would strongly advise against that.
compare that to cheap selection brand (food basics) 100% whole wheat bread (including the germ), which i can't find a picture of, but has the following for two slices:
calories: 170 g (but healthy people don't care about calories, they care about nutrition, because they burn calories, daily)
fat: 3%
fibre: 18%
protein: 7g
sodium: 10%
potassium: 4%
calcium: 4%
iron: 10%
thiamine: 15%
riboflavin: 6%
niacin: 25%
b6: 6%
folate: 5%
pantothenate: 8%
phosphorus: 14%
magnesium: 17%
zinc: 14%
selenium: 55%
maganese: 67%
molybdenum: 59%
i presume that molybdenum is for a nice, healthy glow.
you'll also note that the picture is for five slices, so you'd actually want to cut the percentage of calcium & iron down to two fifths of it to get a fair comparison, which is only 2.4%.
does the pumpernickel lack all of this good stuff? is it just empty calories? supposedly, it doesn't, but nobody measures it, so you don't know what you're buying.
the 100% whole wheat is consequently a far safer choice than the whole grain, if you're concerned about nutrient concentration, because you actually know what's in it because it's measured and regulated. you have no actual idea whether the whole grain bread you're buying has anything of value in it or not - it might very well just be empty sugar. you could never prove otherwise. you just have to take it on faith, which is the lowest form of reasoning. i'll take the fortified whole wheat over the unfortified whole grain, any day.
where are the b vitamins?
the answer is that they're in there in theory, but they aren't regulated. so, you don't really know. it doesn't say there aren't b vitamins, like it does for c and a. but, there's no actual meaningful evidence that your whole grain bread has any vitamins in it at all - it's something you have to take on empty faith. i would strongly advise against that.
compare that to cheap selection brand (food basics) 100% whole wheat bread (including the germ), which i can't find a picture of, but has the following for two slices:
calories: 170 g (but healthy people don't care about calories, they care about nutrition, because they burn calories, daily)
fat: 3%
fibre: 18%
protein: 7g
sodium: 10%
potassium: 4%
calcium: 4%
iron: 10%
thiamine: 15%
riboflavin: 6%
niacin: 25%
b6: 6%
folate: 5%
pantothenate: 8%
phosphorus: 14%
magnesium: 17%
zinc: 14%
selenium: 55%
maganese: 67%
molybdenum: 59%
i presume that molybdenum is for a nice, healthy glow.
you'll also note that the picture is for five slices, so you'd actually want to cut the percentage of calcium & iron down to two fifths of it to get a fair comparison, which is only 2.4%.
does the pumpernickel lack all of this good stuff? is it just empty calories? supposedly, it doesn't, but nobody measures it, so you don't know what you're buying.
the 100% whole wheat is consequently a far safer choice than the whole grain, if you're concerned about nutrient concentration, because you actually know what's in it because it's measured and regulated. you have no actual idea whether the whole grain bread you're buying has anything of value in it or not - it might very well just be empty sugar. you could never prove otherwise. you just have to take it on faith, which is the lowest form of reasoning. i'll take the fortified whole wheat over the unfortified whole grain, any day.
but, what i really want is some fortified pumpernickel, with those kind of numbers on the side.
should you eat rye or whole wheat?
that's a can of worms, from what i can tell....
in theory, rye may be preferable, but it doesn't seem to be fortified. so, if you take a loaf of $5.00 rye bread and put it side by side with a loaf of $0.99 whole wheat bread, and you check the nutrient content on the side of the packaging, you may be surprised to see that the whole wheat bread actually blows the rye away. but, this is because the whole wheat is regulated here in canada, so nutrients are added to it, and the rye is not. it's consequently misleading, and i know that.
i switched to the whole wheat more due to cost; when i was eating a few slices of bread a week, i didn't mind shelling out for fancy rye or pumpernickel, but now that eggs are being eaten every second day, roughly, i'm tripling or quadrupling the amount of bread i'm consuming, and the fact that the brown broad is a fifth of the price was very appealing to me.
what i wish was that the fancier breads were better regulated so i could do an apples-to-apples comparison regarding vitamins and other nutrients. general statements about rye flour may or may not be particular to specific brands; i don't want to make assumptions about the milling process, and what actually does or doesn't exist in any particular loaf.
the whole wheat is the safer bet, in that sense.
but, i'm going to continue to keep my eye out for a rye alternative that is properly fortified.
that's a can of worms, from what i can tell....
in theory, rye may be preferable, but it doesn't seem to be fortified. so, if you take a loaf of $5.00 rye bread and put it side by side with a loaf of $0.99 whole wheat bread, and you check the nutrient content on the side of the packaging, you may be surprised to see that the whole wheat bread actually blows the rye away. but, this is because the whole wheat is regulated here in canada, so nutrients are added to it, and the rye is not. it's consequently misleading, and i know that.
i switched to the whole wheat more due to cost; when i was eating a few slices of bread a week, i didn't mind shelling out for fancy rye or pumpernickel, but now that eggs are being eaten every second day, roughly, i'm tripling or quadrupling the amount of bread i'm consuming, and the fact that the brown broad is a fifth of the price was very appealing to me.
what i wish was that the fancier breads were better regulated so i could do an apples-to-apples comparison regarding vitamins and other nutrients. general statements about rye flour may or may not be particular to specific brands; i don't want to make assumptions about the milling process, and what actually does or doesn't exist in any particular loaf.
the whole wheat is the safer bet, in that sense.
but, i'm going to continue to keep my eye out for a rye alternative that is properly fortified.
ok, i finally got those noisetrade.com links updated to smashwords, lulu, bandcamp & drive links. that was time consuming, but it's done.
i need to really write that story next. it's coming.
i'm scatter-brained, and i'm having difficulty figuring out if i picked up a cold (it could be anything, there's no reason to assume it's covid-19, and i have no intention of quarantining myself over the common cold, so i'm not getting tested. there's nothing i can accomplish by presenting myself to the medical authorities. i'll just stay in for a few days, thanks.) or if i'm reacting to the smoker(s) upstairs, but the decrease in temperature outside is helping clear the air out in here a little and it's definitely waking me up a bit. i feel like i'm in a smoky room, and have a dry cough and a sore throat, but i can't smell it or identify the direction. but, if i stick my nose in something with a strong odour, i can smell it, clearly.
i'm also wondering if i'm having a glycemic reaction to my change in diet. i've been eating mostly pasta for years, now; i've now switched to a diet composed solely of omelettes and fruit. i also switched from rye to whole wheat bread. my sugar levels were fine, if bumping a little, when i tested them a few months ago, but that was before i switched. what i'm feeling is consistent with an onset of diabetes, which i have no evidence of in terms of sugar levels, but i'm consistently concerned about in the context of actual symptoms and what i think is a slow onset of ms, and which i know i can't do anything about. to be clear: my concern is i may be developing diabetes as a complication of a slow onset of ms, rather than as a result of diet, but that the switch in diet (to less glucose, actually.) may be messing with me. if i'm concerned about diabetes, and i slightly am, then the new diet is about as good as i can get. the fruit i eat - blueberries, strawberries, bananas, kiwis, raspberries - are all actually relatively low in glycemic index. it was my reliance on cheap pasta that was the more likely complicating factor, and switching to eggs is consequently actually a good idea, so long as i can manage to get used to it.
put another way, i may be sort of coming down from a pasta dependence and going through glucose withdrawals, which is potentially dangerous but probably good in the long run.
so, i'm feeling like i might be bedridden for a few days, but i'm not sure why, yet.
one story coming up...
...and, then i can get back to consolidating the four blogs from april 1 to present, and recalibrating myself and what i'm doing.
i need to really write that story next. it's coming.
i'm scatter-brained, and i'm having difficulty figuring out if i picked up a cold (it could be anything, there's no reason to assume it's covid-19, and i have no intention of quarantining myself over the common cold, so i'm not getting tested. there's nothing i can accomplish by presenting myself to the medical authorities. i'll just stay in for a few days, thanks.) or if i'm reacting to the smoker(s) upstairs, but the decrease in temperature outside is helping clear the air out in here a little and it's definitely waking me up a bit. i feel like i'm in a smoky room, and have a dry cough and a sore throat, but i can't smell it or identify the direction. but, if i stick my nose in something with a strong odour, i can smell it, clearly.
i'm also wondering if i'm having a glycemic reaction to my change in diet. i've been eating mostly pasta for years, now; i've now switched to a diet composed solely of omelettes and fruit. i also switched from rye to whole wheat bread. my sugar levels were fine, if bumping a little, when i tested them a few months ago, but that was before i switched. what i'm feeling is consistent with an onset of diabetes, which i have no evidence of in terms of sugar levels, but i'm consistently concerned about in the context of actual symptoms and what i think is a slow onset of ms, and which i know i can't do anything about. to be clear: my concern is i may be developing diabetes as a complication of a slow onset of ms, rather than as a result of diet, but that the switch in diet (to less glucose, actually.) may be messing with me. if i'm concerned about diabetes, and i slightly am, then the new diet is about as good as i can get. the fruit i eat - blueberries, strawberries, bananas, kiwis, raspberries - are all actually relatively low in glycemic index. it was my reliance on cheap pasta that was the more likely complicating factor, and switching to eggs is consequently actually a good idea, so long as i can manage to get used to it.
put another way, i may be sort of coming down from a pasta dependence and going through glucose withdrawals, which is potentially dangerous but probably good in the long run.
so, i'm feeling like i might be bedridden for a few days, but i'm not sure why, yet.
one story coming up...
...and, then i can get back to consolidating the four blogs from april 1 to present, and recalibrating myself and what i'm doing.
so, these are my priorities:
1) we need increases in spending, not cuts. government spending is far too low.
2) we don't really need to balance the budget, but we need to be careful that the debt doesn't get too out of control because the imf will come in with restructuring programs if we're not careful.
3) the structural deficit was created by foolish tax cuts - the gst cut, corporate tax cuts, tax cuts on the rich. it should be fixed by restoring tax rates to historically normal levels.
4) the boomers have been living for free for essentially their whole lives, and it's time to send the tax collectors after them to have them pay their fair share into the system.
1) we need increases in spending, not cuts. government spending is far too low.
2) we don't really need to balance the budget, but we need to be careful that the debt doesn't get too out of control because the imf will come in with restructuring programs if we're not careful.
3) the structural deficit was created by foolish tax cuts - the gst cut, corporate tax cuts, tax cuts on the rich. it should be fixed by restoring tax rates to historically normal levels.
4) the boomers have been living for free for essentially their whole lives, and it's time to send the tax collectors after them to have them pay their fair share into the system.
history is actually really clear on this point, though: if you elect the conservatives, they won't actually balance the budget, they'll just cut taxes even further and make the problem even worse.
and, when the imf comes banging on the door looking for your pensions because you spent your whole life avoiding taxes, and are now too old to fend for yourself, don't expect your kids to rally around you, and don't say we didn't warn you.
and, when the imf comes banging on the door looking for your pensions because you spent your whole life avoiding taxes, and are now too old to fend for yourself, don't expect your kids to rally around you, and don't say we didn't warn you.
government spending is definitely not too high in this country. if anything, the raft of social issues we have in front of us indicate that spending is nowhere near what it should be. and, let's be clear here - markets don't solve problems, they just make everything worse.
if there's a dramatic disconnect between revenue and spending, it's because taxes are way too low to cover the spending we need to undertake to balance out inequalities and make everybody's lives liveable.
there's lots of smart ways to raise taxes. we could undo the stupid gst cut that harper did, for starters, and that created a structural deficit that's never really been addressed. we could bring in a transaction tax on internet purchases, to try to adjust to the changes in consumer behaviour. i'm an advocate of an increase in property taxes to help municipalities. corporate taxes have been moving in the wrong direction for decades, and need to be brought back. and, taxes on the wealthy are obscenely low.
if the conservatives really care about the budget deficit, that is what needs to be done - not further cuts in a society that has already been cut to the bone, and is leaking marrow, as it is.
if there's a dramatic disconnect between revenue and spending, it's because taxes are way too low to cover the spending we need to undertake to balance out inequalities and make everybody's lives liveable.
there's lots of smart ways to raise taxes. we could undo the stupid gst cut that harper did, for starters, and that created a structural deficit that's never really been addressed. we could bring in a transaction tax on internet purchases, to try to adjust to the changes in consumer behaviour. i'm an advocate of an increase in property taxes to help municipalities. corporate taxes have been moving in the wrong direction for decades, and need to be brought back. and, taxes on the wealthy are obscenely low.
if the conservatives really care about the budget deficit, that is what needs to be done - not further cuts in a society that has already been cut to the bone, and is leaking marrow, as it is.
you know, we could erase this tomorrow at the stroke of a pen.
i've been saying for years that nobody cares, and i still think that's true, but that doesn't mean it's necessarily a good thing. i'm not running over this again, but it's just a question of keeping the imf away.
and, to the extent that i do care, i want to see higher taxes to offset the spending, not cuts in spending to reduce the deficit.
https://www.mitchelladvocate.com/opinion/kurl-lessons-for-erin-otoole-canadians-care-about-the-deficit-but-they-care-about-covid-impact-more/wcm/7ea11443-7369-46a9-9702-4fbe8cce1fc1
i've been saying for years that nobody cares, and i still think that's true, but that doesn't mean it's necessarily a good thing. i'm not running over this again, but it's just a question of keeping the imf away.
and, to the extent that i do care, i want to see higher taxes to offset the spending, not cuts in spending to reduce the deficit.
https://www.mitchelladvocate.com/opinion/kurl-lessons-for-erin-otoole-canadians-care-about-the-deficit-but-they-care-about-covid-impact-more/wcm/7ea11443-7369-46a9-9702-4fbe8cce1fc1
Saturday, September 5, 2020
yes, i can present an obvious source of the error in the modeling, otoh, and that's actually with black voters.
now, i'm just hypothesizing this; i'll leave it to somebody else to look it up. but, black turnout in 2008 was through the roof, and he got more than 99% of it. i can't imagine any modelling that would have given any candidate 99% of anything, or at least not anywhere west of moscow.
and, that might be an ironic part of the answer - it could be that a part of the reason the wilder effect didn't show up with obama is because he overpowered it with exceedingly strong black support.
you'd have to look at the old models and crunch the numbers and figure it out, but i'd guess you can get a substantive amount of the discrepancy that way, without even looking at whether white voters lied to pollsters or not.
now, i'm just hypothesizing this; i'll leave it to somebody else to look it up. but, black turnout in 2008 was through the roof, and he got more than 99% of it. i can't imagine any modelling that would have given any candidate 99% of anything, or at least not anywhere west of moscow.
and, that might be an ironic part of the answer - it could be that a part of the reason the wilder effect didn't show up with obama is because he overpowered it with exceedingly strong black support.
you'd have to look at the old models and crunch the numbers and figure it out, but i'd guess you can get a substantive amount of the discrepancy that way, without even looking at whether white voters lied to pollsters or not.
i'm sure that the internet just imploded.
listen - he's the only blackish looking candidate i know of, ever, that made sure to tell everybody he was half white, every time he spoke. generally, black politicians run as being black, and embrace their blackness, and make it a part of their campaign. obama didn't do that - he ran as biracial, and put it at the very front of his messaging.
so, at the least, it's an apples and oranges comparison, because he really wasn't like somebody like jesse jackson, who was 130% black and wouldn't go five minutes without asserting it.
a lot was written about obama being a blank slate - voters projected what they wanted on to him. so, he was a socialist, if you wanted him to be, and a conservative if you wanted that, too - or he was what you most feared, if you leaned towards the opposing team.
i don't think it's such a stretch to think that a substantive number of white voters took his arguments for post-racialism, and his biography as growing up the son of a white woman from kansas, the way they wanted to, and projected an essentially white image of him.
you can agree with me or not, but i think it should be acknowledged, at least, that obama was different than virtually any other black politician in terms of his identity, and it makes a great deal of sense to tie things like an absence of the bradley effect to that rather clear matter-of-fact.
listen - he's the only blackish looking candidate i know of, ever, that made sure to tell everybody he was half white, every time he spoke. generally, black politicians run as being black, and embrace their blackness, and make it a part of their campaign. obama didn't do that - he ran as biracial, and put it at the very front of his messaging.
so, at the least, it's an apples and oranges comparison, because he really wasn't like somebody like jesse jackson, who was 130% black and wouldn't go five minutes without asserting it.
a lot was written about obama being a blank slate - voters projected what they wanted on to him. so, he was a socialist, if you wanted him to be, and a conservative if you wanted that, too - or he was what you most feared, if you leaned towards the opposing team.
i don't think it's such a stretch to think that a substantive number of white voters took his arguments for post-racialism, and his biography as growing up the son of a white woman from kansas, the way they wanted to, and projected an essentially white image of him.
you can agree with me or not, but i think it should be acknowledged, at least, that obama was different than virtually any other black politician in terms of his identity, and it makes a great deal of sense to tie things like an absence of the bradley effect to that rather clear matter-of-fact.
why didn't the bradley effect apply to obama?
i don't know.
one hypothesis is that, at least in the primary, clinton's own bradley effect (as a woman) was actually more powerful, and that the sexism overpowered the racism. that might actually be true, but you're stacking hypotheticals. who knows, really.
another thing to point out is that the nature of obama's coalition was hard to poll, in the first place. my memory of 2008 was that obama's vote was incredibly efficient, so you just might end up accidentally undoing a bradley effect by weighting the polls badly, in trying to peg his support, which was very intensely concentrated in urban regions.
a third suggestion is that he was just an enigma; every rule has exceptions.
but, i'm actually going to throw this out there: barack obama is actually white. well, it's true - he's white in almost every way. you have to bring in jim crow laws to decide he's black. i know a lot of people won't really like this analysis, but the fact is that he massively played up his kansas roots & his white mother, and while he can "pass as black" when he has to, he's more comfortable in an essentially culturally white exterior.
so, it could be that the bradley effect didn't apply to obama because voters didn't really interpret him as black.
i don't know.
one hypothesis is that, at least in the primary, clinton's own bradley effect (as a woman) was actually more powerful, and that the sexism overpowered the racism. that might actually be true, but you're stacking hypotheticals. who knows, really.
another thing to point out is that the nature of obama's coalition was hard to poll, in the first place. my memory of 2008 was that obama's vote was incredibly efficient, so you just might end up accidentally undoing a bradley effect by weighting the polls badly, in trying to peg his support, which was very intensely concentrated in urban regions.
a third suggestion is that he was just an enigma; every rule has exceptions.
but, i'm actually going to throw this out there: barack obama is actually white. well, it's true - he's white in almost every way. you have to bring in jim crow laws to decide he's black. i know a lot of people won't really like this analysis, but the fact is that he massively played up his kansas roots & his white mother, and while he can "pass as black" when he has to, he's more comfortable in an essentially culturally white exterior.
so, it could be that the bradley effect didn't apply to obama because voters didn't really interpret him as black.
"before you diagnose yourself with depression or low self-esteem, first make sure that you are not, in fact, just surrounded by assholes.”
it's a cliche, and one of the first memes i saw back in the day.
but, it's true.
and, i'm pretty sure my problem is the latter, not the former.
so, i don't need drugs; i need a safe place to exist, where i never have to deal with other people ever again...
it's a cliche, and one of the first memes i saw back in the day.
but, it's true.
and, i'm pretty sure my problem is the latter, not the former.
so, i don't need drugs; i need a safe place to exist, where i never have to deal with other people ever again...
i should post the record.
and, maybe it'll chill me out a little.
this is kind of a lost classic. somebody might correct me, but i believe this is the first thing that the singer from skinny puppy did after the band imploded c. 1995. there was a slew of key/goettel releases directly after goettel died....of a heroin overdose....but ogre was quiet for a while. he may have been on tour with ministry and/or pigface...kmfdm, even?
this was with martin atkins, mostly, although mark walk was also involved.
it's a concept record that is critical of ritalin use in children.
and, maybe it'll chill me out a little.
this is kind of a lost classic. somebody might correct me, but i believe this is the first thing that the singer from skinny puppy did after the band imploded c. 1995. there was a slew of key/goettel releases directly after goettel died....of a heroin overdose....but ogre was quiet for a while. he may have been on tour with ministry and/or pigface...kmfdm, even?
this was with martin atkins, mostly, although mark walk was also involved.
it's a concept record that is critical of ritalin use in children.
it's easy to see why we have such a problem with opiates in this country: the doctors prescribe it like it's candy, even when people vehemently scream that they don't want it.
that wasn't the first time that er tried to give me opiates.
it wasn't even the second.
it was actually the third.
and, you'd have to tie me down and inject it, because that's one of the very few ways to generate violence in me; i'm a passive, non-violent person, but you put that shit near me, and you'd better be wearing head gear, cause i'm going to react like a hungry cougar and go for your eyes and your neck...
that wasn't the first time that er tried to give me opiates.
it wasn't even the second.
it was actually the third.
and, you'd have to tie me down and inject it, because that's one of the very few ways to generate violence in me; i'm a passive, non-violent person, but you put that shit near me, and you'd better be wearing head gear, cause i'm going to react like a hungry cougar and go for your eyes and your neck...
i am not going to be a friendly person for the next little while, as i'm going to be dealing with hormonal changes that i don't want and don't expect i'll be able to process without fits of violence.
but, what the hospital is telling me is that i have to actually have a reaction before it will treat me, that it won't act preventatively.
...because they're a bunch of fucking idiots.
and, i hope every single one of them dies a horrible death. and soon.
but, what the hospital is telling me is that i have to actually have a reaction before it will treat me, that it won't act preventatively.
...because they're a bunch of fucking idiots.
and, i hope every single one of them dies a horrible death. and soon.
the emergency supply of testosterone blockers was at half the dosage i've been taking since june. it's not going to be enough, and i'm going to need to act aggressively to get the surgery; in the meantime, i should expect severe levels of depression as a result of the rising t-levels that i've been trying to avoid.
and, i can only hope that it's enough to survive until i can chop them out and sacrifice them to demeter.
that ritual will happen, btw - i will get these horrible things in a jar, and take them to a field and burn them.
and, i can only hope that it's enough to survive until i can chop them out and sacrifice them to demeter.
that ritual will happen, btw - i will get these horrible things in a jar, and take them to a field and burn them.
again: i don't think i suffer from a physical form of depression.
but, people bum me out; i can't deal with the selfishness, the stupidity and the ignorance. it just makes me want to roll up in a ball and cry.
what i need is a way to avoid people, and all of the treatment options are built around trying to get me to interact with them.
i'm as happy as i can be when i don't have to deal with the consequences of other people's stupidity. so, if i could build an isolation chamber that was big enough to hold my things, and prevented me from interacting with everybody else in the world in any way, i'd be ecstatic, really.
it's not realistic, obviously.
all i can do is yell and scream and create conflict and piss people off enough that they do what i need; it's the only way to exist in a society like ours, where everybody's such a piece of shit.
i have a story to write...
but, people bum me out; i can't deal with the selfishness, the stupidity and the ignorance. it just makes me want to roll up in a ball and cry.
what i need is a way to avoid people, and all of the treatment options are built around trying to get me to interact with them.
i'm as happy as i can be when i don't have to deal with the consequences of other people's stupidity. so, if i could build an isolation chamber that was big enough to hold my things, and prevented me from interacting with everybody else in the world in any way, i'd be ecstatic, really.
it's not realistic, obviously.
all i can do is yell and scream and create conflict and piss people off enough that they do what i need; it's the only way to exist in a society like ours, where everybody's such a piece of shit.
i have a story to write...
so, i've got my head in too many places at once and trying to do everything and succeeding at nothing. i've been eating, typing and cleaning, without much of a clear plan; i do that when i'm in shock, or otherwise weirded out, and i think that's the right way to describe reality right now. i thought i had to get downtown to present myself for the ticket, but of course it's closed and operating over email instead, so i should be inside until i have to get more estrace mid-month.
i'll need to make some calls on monday regarding a number of things.
i want to do some major cleaning in here, but it's pointless if the pig is smoking. i'm not going to do laundry and scrub down the walls if it's just going to emit more pollution, what's the point? i'll be cleaning 20 hours a day, with no end. i'd might as well sit in my own filth, instead.
i at least got some fans set up in here, and it's making somewhat of a difference, but i'm going to need to wait until the temperature comes way, way down before i'm able to do a serious overturn. it was nice for a few weeks in the late spring but, as it is, opening the window in this neighbourhood just makes things worse.
so, i feel like i'm tied to my bedpost with no meaningful way out. it's deeply depressing.
i should try to get back to what i was doing and react to the pollution from upstairs as it presents itself. it may mean running the shower for long periods, but so be it.
once i've got that under control, i can make an analysis regarding what to do about cleaning in here, and whether i think it's a waste of time or not.
i'll need to make some calls on monday regarding a number of things.
i want to do some major cleaning in here, but it's pointless if the pig is smoking. i'm not going to do laundry and scrub down the walls if it's just going to emit more pollution, what's the point? i'll be cleaning 20 hours a day, with no end. i'd might as well sit in my own filth, instead.
i at least got some fans set up in here, and it's making somewhat of a difference, but i'm going to need to wait until the temperature comes way, way down before i'm able to do a serious overturn. it was nice for a few weeks in the late spring but, as it is, opening the window in this neighbourhood just makes things worse.
so, i feel like i'm tied to my bedpost with no meaningful way out. it's deeply depressing.
i should try to get back to what i was doing and react to the pollution from upstairs as it presents itself. it may mean running the shower for long periods, but so be it.
once i've got that under control, i can make an analysis regarding what to do about cleaning in here, and whether i think it's a waste of time or not.
this article is overthinking it, i think.
i don't think anybody thinks biden is responsible for the looting, or that trump could do much to stop it, either. i mean, what could trump do? he could declare martial law, that's about it. i don't think wisconsites want that.
it's more of a question of how people organize and separate on the ground; you vote with or against your uncle, or your friends on facebook, and these sort of group mentalities take over, in absence of any really clear logical answer. i mean, what's the answer here? nobody's talking about that, they're just concerned about the fallout, and for good reason; it's not clear what you actually do about this. i'd like to get rid of the cops, but i know that's unlikely, and that trying is full of likely potential pitfalls that could make the issue far worse.
it consequently doesn't help for biden to distance himself from the situation if people are ultimately voting against that frenemy on facebook that, to them, represents biden, rather than against biden, himself.
and, like i say: you only need small numbers of defectors to be decisive in close races, especially given that what's happening is so unlikely to swing voters from trump to biden. like the bet soros made so many years ago, trump has nothing to lose and everything to gain.
i stated before that this isn't biden's fault, but i don't think what he's doing is going to help much.
biden's best tactic here is neither to distance himself from nor align himself with these protests, but to try to change the topic to something he has an advantage in, like health care.
https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2020/09/what-biden-understands-left-does-not/616000/
i don't think anybody thinks biden is responsible for the looting, or that trump could do much to stop it, either. i mean, what could trump do? he could declare martial law, that's about it. i don't think wisconsites want that.
it's more of a question of how people organize and separate on the ground; you vote with or against your uncle, or your friends on facebook, and these sort of group mentalities take over, in absence of any really clear logical answer. i mean, what's the answer here? nobody's talking about that, they're just concerned about the fallout, and for good reason; it's not clear what you actually do about this. i'd like to get rid of the cops, but i know that's unlikely, and that trying is full of likely potential pitfalls that could make the issue far worse.
it consequently doesn't help for biden to distance himself from the situation if people are ultimately voting against that frenemy on facebook that, to them, represents biden, rather than against biden, himself.
and, like i say: you only need small numbers of defectors to be decisive in close races, especially given that what's happening is so unlikely to swing voters from trump to biden. like the bet soros made so many years ago, trump has nothing to lose and everything to gain.
i stated before that this isn't biden's fault, but i don't think what he's doing is going to help much.
biden's best tactic here is neither to distance himself from nor align himself with these protests, but to try to change the topic to something he has an advantage in, like health care.
https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2020/09/what-biden-understands-left-does-not/616000/
hydro has some issues, but we can fix them, and it is legitimately clean & renewable when done well. it's also a major potential export. it's baffling that this resource has been left undeveloped for so long.
nuclear, oil, coal, etc have issues that can't be fixed.
and wind & solar are useful as supplementary, but not primary, sources.
if we get fusion or anti-matter one day, great; for now, hydro is the best thing we've got.
nuclear, oil, coal, etc have issues that can't be fixed.
and wind & solar are useful as supplementary, but not primary, sources.
if we get fusion or anti-matter one day, great; for now, hydro is the best thing we've got.
he died of cancer at an absurdly young age.
if the cause of his cancer was ultimately some kind of exposure in iraq - something that is noted by researchers but poorly understood - then that would make him about as stupid a person as has ever existed, given he had no reason to put himself at that kind of risk, as the son of a sitting senator and eventual vice-president.
i don't know if i'd call him a sucker..
i think i'd give him a darwin award, though.
if the cause of his cancer was ultimately some kind of exposure in iraq - something that is noted by researchers but poorly understood - then that would make him about as stupid a person as has ever existed, given he had no reason to put himself at that kind of risk, as the son of a sitting senator and eventual vice-president.
i don't know if i'd call him a sucker..
i think i'd give him a darwin award, though.
here's some takedowns of mccain from the left:
1) https://www.jacobinmag.com/2018/08/john-mccain-was-not-hero-obituary-war-racism-sexism
2) https://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:B0q8mquH_7YJ:https://www.independent.co.uk/voices/john-mccain-death-legacy-trump-us-senator-vietnam-war-a8511441.html+&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=ca
3) https://www.commondreams.org/news/2008/10/07/mccain-linked-private-iran-contra-group
if you think i'm supposed to get teary-eyed about a viciously misogynistic, racist, lying, crooked, war mongering piece of shit like john mccain...
bomb-bomb-bomb...bomb-bomb-bomb his grave.....
1) https://www.jacobinmag.com/2018/08/john-mccain-was-not-hero-obituary-war-racism-sexism
2) https://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:B0q8mquH_7YJ:https://www.independent.co.uk/voices/john-mccain-death-legacy-trump-us-senator-vietnam-war-a8511441.html+&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=ca
3) https://www.commondreams.org/news/2008/10/07/mccain-linked-private-iran-contra-group
if you think i'm supposed to get teary-eyed about a viciously misogynistic, racist, lying, crooked, war mongering piece of shit like john mccain...
bomb-bomb-bomb...bomb-bomb-bomb his grave.....
this is what john mccain should really be remembered for:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keating_Five
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keating_Five
right.
so, we're all going to have to adapt, now.
you can't hide in your basement from the bogeyman, forever - you need to go out and face the world and take risks.
https://montrealgazette.com/news/quebec/quebec-provides-list-of-47-schools-with-covid-19-cases
so, we're all going to have to adapt, now.
you can't hide in your basement from the bogeyman, forever - you need to go out and face the world and take risks.
https://montrealgazette.com/news/quebec/quebec-provides-list-of-47-schools-with-covid-19-cases
"progressives" are so fucking ignorant....
game theory is not about "playing games". in fact, it's of almost no use, whatsoever, in trying to win things like poker, or do well with stocks. the right branch of mathematics to maximize your chances in competitive sports tournaments is probability theory.
what game theory does is mathematically model conflict between two or more actors, and it's mostly used in the fields of applied psychology, political science, economics and evolutionary biology.
all that a "progressive" is telling you when they say "they don't play games" when game theory is invoked to study any sort of conflict is "i'm too ignorant to follow the conversation, and i'm too uneducated to understand the language you're utilizing".
they literally don't understand the words being said to them, it's that simple.
but, when a trained economist reacts that way, they're merely being disingenuous, because they do understand the language, and so should be labeled dishonest rather than ignorant - and cast aside as a demagogue, trying to confuse you. that is, the economist knows full well why that kind of response is just base ignorance - but they think you don't, and are trying to confuse or mislead you with lies.
game theory is not about "playing games". in fact, it's of almost no use, whatsoever, in trying to win things like poker, or do well with stocks. the right branch of mathematics to maximize your chances in competitive sports tournaments is probability theory.
what game theory does is mathematically model conflict between two or more actors, and it's mostly used in the fields of applied psychology, political science, economics and evolutionary biology.
all that a "progressive" is telling you when they say "they don't play games" when game theory is invoked to study any sort of conflict is "i'm too ignorant to follow the conversation, and i'm too uneducated to understand the language you're utilizing".
they literally don't understand the words being said to them, it's that simple.
but, when a trained economist reacts that way, they're merely being disingenuous, because they do understand the language, and so should be labeled dishonest rather than ignorant - and cast aside as a demagogue, trying to confuse you. that is, the economist knows full well why that kind of response is just base ignorance - but they think you don't, and are trying to confuse or mislead you with lies.
that said - and i've said this a few times - i understand that i'm arguing in favour of a strawman.
i'm still expecting an austerity budget at it's core, and that any attempts to address climate change will, while attacked vehemently by the right, ultimately be of minimal actual impact.
this government has been trying to walk a line on this, and ultimately has neither succeeded in assuaging conservatives nor in subduing environmentalists. they're just squeezing themselves out....
i'm open-minded, and i'd like to see what they say before i react. but, my expectations are startlingly low, and i don't expect to be able to support the budget at all.
i'm still expecting an austerity budget at it's core, and that any attempts to address climate change will, while attacked vehemently by the right, ultimately be of minimal actual impact.
this government has been trying to walk a line on this, and ultimately has neither succeeded in assuaging conservatives nor in subduing environmentalists. they're just squeezing themselves out....
i'm open-minded, and i'd like to see what they say before i react. but, my expectations are startlingly low, and i don't expect to be able to support the budget at all.
ford did not win due to the electricity fiasco, although it didn't help. ford won by swinging muslim votes in key ridings, due to the sex ed curriculum.
but, there is indeed a stark warning, and that stark warning should be heeded: lies often win over truth.
don't expect truth to win by default - you have to fight the liars at every turn.
but, there is indeed a stark warning, and that stark warning should be heeded: lies often win over truth.
don't expect truth to win by default - you have to fight the liars at every turn.
i've been clear that i support renationalizing the grid in ontario, and going back to selling it to us at cost.
the way forward in this province is properly designed hydro-electric power systems, that are created in a way that minimizes or eliminates concerns for wildlife in the surrounding areas. this is perfectly feasible, it just needs to be done correctly, in ensuring that the priorities of all species up and down stream are accounted for, at the expense of profiting from the system.
energy production in ontario should belong to ontarians and be produced for ontarians' use-value, not belong to corporations and be produced for surplus-value for elites and foreigners.
the way forward in this province is properly designed hydro-electric power systems, that are created in a way that minimizes or eliminates concerns for wildlife in the surrounding areas. this is perfectly feasible, it just needs to be done correctly, in ensuring that the priorities of all species up and down stream are accounted for, at the expense of profiting from the system.
energy production in ontario should belong to ontarians and be produced for ontarians' use-value, not belong to corporations and be produced for surplus-value for elites and foreigners.
the idea that energy costs in ontario increased due to the embrace of windmills & solar panels as a source into the system is a lie pushed by the right.
the reason that prices have gone up is that the system was deregulated and privatized, and the villain is mike harris, not dalton mcguinty.
prices are set by the ontario energy board and not by the market, and ford himself has demonstrated as much by legislating stronger controls (something wynne should have done, but chose not to; she brought in rebate programs to target the most vulnerable and let the wealthy take it on the chin, instead).
prices have increased due to greed by the corporate sector, and they just blamed it on the environmentalists as an easy scapegoat.
it's just greed.
that is all.
however, there is a cautionary tale for the liberals, here, in how lies spread through media can become compelling, if they are not properly countered. and, that warning is indeed stark: if they allow the dirty-oil backed media to frame a false narrative, they could see history repeat itself.
https://globalnews.ca/news/7316275/justin-trudeau-spending-throne-speech/
the reason that prices have gone up is that the system was deregulated and privatized, and the villain is mike harris, not dalton mcguinty.
prices are set by the ontario energy board and not by the market, and ford himself has demonstrated as much by legislating stronger controls (something wynne should have done, but chose not to; she brought in rebate programs to target the most vulnerable and let the wealthy take it on the chin, instead).
prices have increased due to greed by the corporate sector, and they just blamed it on the environmentalists as an easy scapegoat.
it's just greed.
that is all.
however, there is a cautionary tale for the liberals, here, in how lies spread through media can become compelling, if they are not properly countered. and, that warning is indeed stark: if they allow the dirty-oil backed media to frame a false narrative, they could see history repeat itself.
https://globalnews.ca/news/7316275/justin-trudeau-spending-throne-speech/
if you have a liberal arts degree, or lower, it's important to ensure that you get somebody that knows how to read the polls to read them for you.
don't just read the headlines in the paper - they're frequently misleading. and, don't think you can wing it. you can't.
if you failed grade 10 math and haven't tried since, even if you're a lawyer, then step back and defer.
remember the cliche: lies, damned lies....and statistics.
i'm offering this service for free because i'm an altruist, because i believe in general public education (maybe i've read too much dawkins.) and because i have nothing better to do.
don't just read the headlines in the paper - they're frequently misleading. and, don't think you can wing it. you can't.
if you failed grade 10 math and haven't tried since, even if you're a lawyer, then step back and defer.
remember the cliche: lies, damned lies....and statistics.
i'm offering this service for free because i'm an altruist, because i believe in general public education (maybe i've read too much dawkins.) and because i have nothing better to do.
listen: the only people supporting this shit are psychologically damaged people. this isn't black v white, or right v left; it's sane v crazy.
most of the activists on the ground don't even support what's happening.
and, as mentioned, you just need a very minor swing to be decisive - 1%. that's it.
so, if you're going to throw an internet poll at me that completely counter-intuitively has biden up by 6% (with an 8% margin of error) in the presence of an obvious bradley effect, i'm just going to shrug it off and tell you to wait for better data.
most of the activists on the ground don't even support what's happening.
and, as mentioned, you just need a very minor swing to be decisive - 1%. that's it.
so, if you're going to throw an internet poll at me that completely counter-intuitively has biden up by 6% (with an 8% margin of error) in the presence of an obvious bradley effect, i'm just going to shrug it off and tell you to wait for better data.
again: i'm going to point to the low quality of the polling right now, more than anything else.
but, when polling white liberals in states like wisconsin around things like race riots, you have to understand a concept called a bradley effect. that is, most white liberals are not as honest as i am - white liberals tend to tell white lies when confronted with issues around race.
this is a well established phenomenon, and one that is still very real. i suspect it's happening right in front of you with the polling you're seeing, but you need an actual ballot before you can diagnose it; otherwise, it's just an educated guess to try to make sense of numbers that don't really add up. this is really an obvious classic bradley effect! it's just that you have to do the experiment to be sure.
the most recent measurable bradley effect we saw was in the 2019 canadian election, where last minute polling registered a "surge" for the ndp that was completely absent on the actual ground. this led to poor modelling predictions that should have really been caught by a savvy analyst.
if biden's numbers have improved upon the democratic party's numbers in the region since 2016, it's because he walked into this more appealing to white liberals than clinton was. and, if he wants to flip these states, he needs to do so by holding on to that white liberal support.
anything that has the potentiality to erode that support is going to hurt him in these states - and this has a tremendous potential to, even if respondents have been conditioned by the media to feel ashamed about it, and lie when asked about it.
but, when polling white liberals in states like wisconsin around things like race riots, you have to understand a concept called a bradley effect. that is, most white liberals are not as honest as i am - white liberals tend to tell white lies when confronted with issues around race.
this is a well established phenomenon, and one that is still very real. i suspect it's happening right in front of you with the polling you're seeing, but you need an actual ballot before you can diagnose it; otherwise, it's just an educated guess to try to make sense of numbers that don't really add up. this is really an obvious classic bradley effect! it's just that you have to do the experiment to be sure.
the most recent measurable bradley effect we saw was in the 2019 canadian election, where last minute polling registered a "surge" for the ndp that was completely absent on the actual ground. this led to poor modelling predictions that should have really been caught by a savvy analyst.
if biden's numbers have improved upon the democratic party's numbers in the region since 2016, it's because he walked into this more appealing to white liberals than clinton was. and, if he wants to flip these states, he needs to do so by holding on to that white liberal support.
anything that has the potentiality to erode that support is going to hurt him in these states - and this has a tremendous potential to, even if respondents have been conditioned by the media to feel ashamed about it, and lie when asked about it.
Friday, September 4, 2020
it's interesting to note that the earliest inscription for the "pied piper" uses the latin term magus, meaning magician - or, pagan. he's not called a merchant....and the idea of being sold into slavery takes a hit, due to the specificity of the term.
if they were led out of town by a "magus", that would suggest they were taken away by pagans, whatever the context.
that it was at the solstice would indeed reasonably be of some significance.
if they were led out of town by a "magus", that would suggest they were taken away by pagans, whatever the context.
that it was at the solstice would indeed reasonably be of some significance.
we know they could write.
we just don't have anything that they wrote, that survived.
at least, we don't think we do; we've been able to trace technical roman documents about seafaring and agriculture to pre-roman carthaginian sources. they exist, to us, simply in latin. but, we can decode them, and figure out where they came from.
there may be things that we only know from latin that are ultimately translated german or celtic works, we just haven't figured it out yet.
we just don't have anything that they wrote, that survived.
at least, we don't think we do; we've been able to trace technical roman documents about seafaring and agriculture to pre-roman carthaginian sources. they exist, to us, simply in latin. but, we can decode them, and figure out where they came from.
there may be things that we only know from latin that are ultimately translated german or celtic works, we just haven't figured it out yet.
to clarify a misunderstood point...
the germans and celts had a writing system, we just have almost no record of it. so, you hear christians say things like "the germans left us without a history", but this is a deeply misleading statement. what seems to be more true is that the romans completely eradicated any trace of their writing in the areas they conquered (much as they did with the carthaginians), leaving only scattered remnants in areas that never saw direct roman control, like the ogham scripts in ireland, the norse sagas in iceland and the gothic runes in the east.
so, it's true that virtually everything we know about the celts & germans was written by the romans, but it is actually rather dubious that it's because nothing was written - and more likely because their own history, as they wrote it, was eradicated as an intentional act of genocide.
the germans and celts had a writing system, we just have almost no record of it. so, you hear christians say things like "the germans left us without a history", but this is a deeply misleading statement. what seems to be more true is that the romans completely eradicated any trace of their writing in the areas they conquered (much as they did with the carthaginians), leaving only scattered remnants in areas that never saw direct roman control, like the ogham scripts in ireland, the norse sagas in iceland and the gothic runes in the east.
so, it's true that virtually everything we know about the celts & germans was written by the romans, but it is actually rather dubious that it's because nothing was written - and more likely because their own history, as they wrote it, was eradicated as an intentional act of genocide.
it's a good example of how blurry our own history is. this isn't pre-history; it's roughly contemporary with aquinas, and marco polo. but, the christians destroyed everything...
on first glance, it sounds like a sanitation of a devshirme raid, but it seems too early for that. would the christians have rounded up kids like this? well, look at the residential school system in canada (and australia and south africa) for a parallel; it's not that crazy, but i don't know of any comparisons directly in europe. generally, the christians had the good sense to realize they could brainwash the young ones, and only killed off the adults.
could they have been sold off into slavery by italian merchants? that's not too outlandish, in this period.
but, my gut tells me that this is a late example of human sacrifice, perhaps in reaction to a lengthy period of drought. and, some cursory research does tell me that there were frequent droughts in this area of europe at the time.
sadly, we'll never know our own history, because it was purposefully destroyed or overwritten by the religious authorities. we can only guess, and warn others of the dangers of abrahamic colonization.
http://www.bbc.com/travel/story/20200902-the-grim-truth-behind-the-pied-piper
on first glance, it sounds like a sanitation of a devshirme raid, but it seems too early for that. would the christians have rounded up kids like this? well, look at the residential school system in canada (and australia and south africa) for a parallel; it's not that crazy, but i don't know of any comparisons directly in europe. generally, the christians had the good sense to realize they could brainwash the young ones, and only killed off the adults.
could they have been sold off into slavery by italian merchants? that's not too outlandish, in this period.
but, my gut tells me that this is a late example of human sacrifice, perhaps in reaction to a lengthy period of drought. and, some cursory research does tell me that there were frequent droughts in this area of europe at the time.
sadly, we'll never know our own history, because it was purposefully destroyed or overwritten by the religious authorities. we can only guess, and warn others of the dangers of abrahamic colonization.
http://www.bbc.com/travel/story/20200902-the-grim-truth-behind-the-pied-piper
i may have been the person that invented anti-choice as a replacement for pro-life many years ago, and the reasoning underlying the shift in language was that conservatives are massive hypocrites in their rejection of abortion and their support for war.
if they were really pro-life, they'd be anti-war, too - and against the death penalty.
and, so, i allowed some christian pacifists to use the term, and started calling dime a dozen conservative anti-abortion activists anti-choice. it picked up after that.
i would like to present a similar shift in language around military service; stopping calling them men and women.
start calling then boys and girls, instead.
if they were really pro-life, they'd be anti-war, too - and against the death penalty.
and, so, i allowed some christian pacifists to use the term, and started calling dime a dozen conservative anti-abortion activists anti-choice. it picked up after that.
i would like to present a similar shift in language around military service; stopping calling them men and women.
start calling then boys and girls, instead.
hrmmn.
sounds like something i might say, frankly.
the president is the commander-in-chief, so he can't be talking like that, even if the sentiment is essentially correct, and one i broadly share.
fuck the troops....
and, guess what gi joe? you don't wanna get blown up fighting for corporatism and the upper class, then don't sign up for combat. you won't see a tear from me, when you die - you fascist scum.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/trump-said-us-soldiers-injured-and-killed-in-war-were-losers-magazine-reports/2020/09/03/6e1725cc-ee35-11ea-99a1-71343d03bc29_story.html
sounds like something i might say, frankly.
the president is the commander-in-chief, so he can't be talking like that, even if the sentiment is essentially correct, and one i broadly share.
fuck the troops....
and, guess what gi joe? you don't wanna get blown up fighting for corporatism and the upper class, then don't sign up for combat. you won't see a tear from me, when you die - you fascist scum.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/trump-said-us-soldiers-injured-and-killed-in-war-were-losers-magazine-reports/2020/09/03/6e1725cc-ee35-11ea-99a1-71343d03bc29_story.html
here's the new complaint against the police:
======
i attended the emergency room at the windsor hospital due to suicidal feelings on the afternoon of august 31st, and was removed violently from the premises around 20:30, and then placed in a holding cell. upon release, before 00:00, i was charged with trespassing, but i went right back because i required immediate care. i was arrested around 3:00, held until 8:30 and ticketed a second time, after that.
it is true that the doctor claimed i was not really suicidal, but merely a disgruntled welfare recipient looking to manipulate the system and insisted i be removed from the premise rather than treated. but, this is a position that has no basis in law, and there is a human rights complaint that will address that concern.
regarding the conduct of the officer, my position is that he had no authority to remove me from the hospital when i was there to seek treatment, and used a disproportionate amount of force to do so. this left me with a sprained leg, bruises and general soreness for several days. when an individual is experiencing a mental health episode, officers should transport them to the hospital for care, not remove them from the hospital kicking and screaming. the officer should have told the doctors that they did not have the authority to remove me from the premises when i was there to seek treatment, rather than act as hired guns to remove me on demand.
medical records & video of the incident will be available from the hospital as they are disclosed. there were also plenty of witnesses who can be identified from the video and asked to testify.
our hospitals cannot function as ongoing milgram's experiments, and cannot be run like detention centres. the rule of law must be asserted, here, and the people responsible for violent outbursts must be held accountable.
here's my new file number:
https://complaint.oiprd.on.ca/OIPRD.Estatus/check_en.aspx?number=E-202009041028022934
======
i attended the emergency room at the windsor hospital due to suicidal feelings on the afternoon of august 31st, and was removed violently from the premises around 20:30, and then placed in a holding cell. upon release, before 00:00, i was charged with trespassing, but i went right back because i required immediate care. i was arrested around 3:00, held until 8:30 and ticketed a second time, after that.
it is true that the doctor claimed i was not really suicidal, but merely a disgruntled welfare recipient looking to manipulate the system and insisted i be removed from the premise rather than treated. but, this is a position that has no basis in law, and there is a human rights complaint that will address that concern.
regarding the conduct of the officer, my position is that he had no authority to remove me from the hospital when i was there to seek treatment, and used a disproportionate amount of force to do so. this left me with a sprained leg, bruises and general soreness for several days. when an individual is experiencing a mental health episode, officers should transport them to the hospital for care, not remove them from the hospital kicking and screaming. the officer should have told the doctors that they did not have the authority to remove me from the premises when i was there to seek treatment, rather than act as hired guns to remove me on demand.
medical records & video of the incident will be available from the hospital as they are disclosed. there were also plenty of witnesses who can be identified from the video and asked to testify.
our hospitals cannot function as ongoing milgram's experiments, and cannot be run like detention centres. the rule of law must be asserted, here, and the people responsible for violent outbursts must be held accountable.
here's my new file number:
https://complaint.oiprd.on.ca/OIPRD.Estatus/check_en.aspx?number=E-202009041028022934
i mean, you know a guy is out of touch when he starts talking about how great of a contribution to civilization that incandescent light bulbs were, in the year 2020. the guy seems to think it's the 60s, or something.
i want to talk about how we get rid of incandescent light bulbs, not about who invented them.
i want to talk about how we get rid of incandescent light bulbs, not about who invented them.
well, the fact is that edison actually invented the light bulb, even if latimer offered a technical improvement to it. what biden is referring to is a pseudo-science called afrocentrism that makes all kinds of outlandish, and easily debunked, claims about the primacy of blackness to civilization.
but, what i want to actually know is this:
who fucking cares what the skin colour of the person that invented the light bulb was?
it's not a question of "rewriting history".
this is a completely irrelevant, absolutely inconsequential question.
it does not matter if the inventor of the light bulb was white, brown, black, yellow....or orange. the orange used to be the silly colour, 'cause nobody was orange. alas.
what matters is that we need to phase lightbulbs out, because they're contributing to the destruction of the planet.
but, what i want to actually know is this:
who fucking cares what the skin colour of the person that invented the light bulb was?
it's not a question of "rewriting history".
this is a completely irrelevant, absolutely inconsequential question.
it does not matter if the inventor of the light bulb was white, brown, black, yellow....or orange. the orange used to be the silly colour, 'cause nobody was orange. alas.
what matters is that we need to phase lightbulbs out, because they're contributing to the destruction of the planet.
Thursday, September 3, 2020
so, i just filed a human rights case.
i'll write a first person blog narrative tonight or in the morning.
========
I feel it's necessary to produce some background information. That is, I'm going to tell you the whole story...
I am a male to female transgendered person that has been on hormones for most of the last twenty years and checks levels roughly once a year. I also have a diagnosed stress disorder; initially i was diagnosed with ptsd, which was later altered to social anxiety disorder, but the differences between these things are not entirely clear. what is clear is that i suffer from stress and anxiety in profound enough ways that i am considered to be unable to work, and currently live on odsp. Unfortunately, I have been noticing that my testosterone levels have been creeping up over the last several years due to the onset of tolerance to the testosterone-suppressing medication (cyproterone acetate), which has been decreasing the efficacy of the estrogen (the feminizing hormone) and having a general masculinizing effect that i've been taking steps to try to undo. In addressing this concern, i've run up against the problem of already being prescribed a high level of testosterone suppressors, and needing to take some other kind of approach to get testosterone levels down to full suppression.
It was decided at my 2017 appointment that, because i was already taking such a high dosage of cyproterone in the context of gender transition, it would be better to have my testicles removed than to try to increase the dosage; while the drug is considered clinically safe at relatively high dosages, and i still had a ways to go before concerns became relevant, if i were to continue to increase my dosage of this medication indefinitely, i'd eventually run up against the potential of damaging my organs, like my liver. it was just time to take the next step in transition, which is removing the source of bodily testosterone, allowing for a reduction of a drug that can have longterm consequences, rather than increase it at the potential of eventual harm, one day.
I saw a urologist in 2017, but he refused to remove my testicles as an elective surgery for what seemed to be religious reasons. While i considered launching a claim at that time, i was in a conflict with my landlord over second hand smoke (i had recently quit smoking) that preoccupied my time, and i ended up with little choice but to put the process off. it wasn't until my 2019 appointment that we made a more serious attempt to have the testicles removed, but when i returned for my 2020 appointment, i learned that the funding request got lost in the office (i had called several times to ask for the status, and was told in error that it was in process).
I also learned at the 2020 appointment, which was at the beginning of june of this year, that my testosterone levels had doubled over the last year, which was consistent with what i was feeling. Given the realities of elective surgery around the pandemic, and the fact that my funding request had been lost, i found myself in a crisis point and suggested that the dosage of cyproterone acetate be increased to prevent the onset of further remasculinization. My doctor instead suggested i try spironolactone if i was unhappy with the cyproterone, and i accepted a prescription, but when i got home and did research into it, i learned that (1) the spiro is less effective than the cyproterone (so switching didn't make sense) and (2) the spiro has more severe complications at lower dosages, indicating that it would make more sense to double my dosage of cyproterone, if what i was concerned about was primarily the safety of the drug. i also double checked that my new dosage was safe by checking the data sheet for it, and learned that i was moving from 33% to 66% of the maximum safe dosage. so, i cancelled the new prescription and sent a fax to my family doctor to double the rx of the initial prescription. as i was confident in my own research, i just merely assumed he would act upon my request, and went ahead and started doubling up, assuming that the new rx would be available for me on my next renewal.
however, when i went to renew, i found that the doctor had faxed back the initial rx for the dosage i was previously on, without explanation. i assumed this was an error. so, i asked the pharmacy to fax back a request for a doubling of the rx a second time, and continued with the increased dosage. i also received a letter in july, indicating that my funding request for testicular removal had been granted; by that time, however, i'd already increased the dosage and decided to stick with it until i could see the doctor next. this carried forwards until the end of august, when my rx ran out and i tried again - with the same result. i took my last cyproterone dosage at 00:00 on august 31st; i needed to find another dosage by noon.
on the evening of the 30th, my pharmacy informed me that, while my rx was still valid, i would no longer be able to bill my insurance company for it because i'd already used up the rx until mid october. i would either need to pay out of pocket (an impossibility, considering my disability status) or ask the doctor to double the rx, to conform to what i'd been taking since early june. worse, my appointment with my family doctor had been postponed at this point, apparently because he was out of the office until mid-september, so i would be unable to speak with him directly.
the pharmacy sent another request on the morning of the 31st, and received back exactly the same response, confirming the initial rx.
baffled by this, i went into the dr's office and spoke with a doctor that was covering for him, who told me that the reason they kept sending back the initial dosage was that there were treatment guidelines that would not allow for a dosage beyond what i was taking. that is, i was already maxxed out on the cyproterone. i explained the situation to him, but he told me his hands were tied - he was *unable* to increase the dosage without exposing himself to liability, and would not do so. while he agreed that the dosage i requested was technically safe in the short term, he insisted it should only be prescribed to prostate cancer patients, and was not moved by my insistence that it was short term, until i could have my testicles removed, as a cancer patient might. he told me i'd have to pay out of pocket, knowing i could not.
so, faced without options, and feeling suicidal, i took myself to the er to explain the scenario - after twenty years of being female-identifying, that is essentially my entire waking life, i was forced with the inevitability of imminent detransition, without there being anything i could do about it. while i did not want to kill myself, i was fully cognizant that the effects of remasculinization would be too much for me to bear, and that i needed immediate intervention to prevent myself from falling into a downward spiral of depression that would have no conceivable endpoint besides me taking my own life. this was a very stressful realization; as mentioned, i suffer from a stress disorder, so an episode of some sort was inevitable, and the er was the right place for me to be while it was happening.
while waiting in the emergency room at the ouelette campus of the windsor hospital, i found myself badly triggered by the temperature. i was wearing a tight-fitting pink tshirt and a pair of stretchy jeans; i would have needed a winter jacket and a toque to feel comfortable in the temperature in the waiting room. while my inability to climatize to even the slightest amount of air conditioning is a known condition for me, i was not able to prevent myself from becoming episodic, and found myself engaging in erratic behaviour to try to warm up - running back and forth across the er room, running on the spot, swaying side to side, and sort of bicycling in motion while sitting in the chair. this attracted the attention of security, who demanded i stop, and this is where the complaint begins.
while this behaviour may have been slightly annoying, it was not threatening to the people around me, and i felt that preventing myself from falling ill due to the cold - something that i know from experience was of serious concern - was of greater importance than stopping some of the other patients from feeling annoyed. i know that i've been in er rooms where patients were experiencing far more annoying symptoms, due to schizophrenia or even mental retardation, than i was; dealing with people having mental breakdowns in whatever capacity is a part of the experience of going to the er, and they'd just have to suffer the minor inconvenience, which is all that it was.
the security guard, however, took it upon himself to get very aggressive with me at this point. first, he asked triage to discharge me without being seen by a doctor, which was granted by the nurse - who i had told moments earlier i was suicidal and episodic. so, i need to get that point across: i told the nurse that i suffered from anxiety and was at the er because i was suicidal and episodic, and she discharged me for being episodic. so, i was asked to leave for displaying the behaviour that brought me to the er in the first place.
rather than leave on request, i cited the canada health act and insisted i had the right to see a doctor when suicidal under stress from anxiety. the security guard on duty, who i later learned was named ryan, denied the universality clause in the canada health act and called the police to remove me from the property instead.
initially, the police attempted to remove me by force, but when i resisted they realized that i was having a mental health episode and relented. after all, when the police are faced with an individual in a mental health crisis, what they do is bring them to the hospital, which is where i already was. after some discussion and debate that i only vaguely remember due to being episodic, but that i recall was at times very heated, the police left the premises. i was called into the hospital shortly after that, but what follows is a continuation of the initial point of conflict, as security clearly felt i should have been removed.
the nurse i saw after triage was the one bright point of all of this and rather kind, as she realized i was shivering due to the air conditioning and brought me some warm blankets. the episode left me both physically and mentally exhausted, and i found myself falling asleep once i got under them - first it was two blankets, and then it was three more, and i could have used another ten to really warm up. this just demonstrates the extent of the situation, and how cold i really was.
i spoke very briefly with a dr. attan, who told me he could prescribe me a dangerous opiate (which i refused), but would not take my request for cyproterone seriously. he told me he'd take a look at my file, and did not return to speak with me. instead, i was asked by the nurse to provide blood & urine samples, and then eventually falsely accused of being under the influence of methamphetamines (something i've never taken before in my life!).
so, to recap: a patient who is diagnosed with a stress order (myself) entered the hospital in a suicidal state due to fear of detransitioning, and when she demonstrated symptoms of that stress disorder due to a real fear of an inevitable traumatic event, she was refused serious treatment, offered opiates as a treatment option instead and then told she must be on methamphetamines, instead of acknowledging the trauma she was experiencing.
if that was not outrageous enough, a psychiatrist (who's name i did not pick up) then appeared to try to talk me through the meth addiction. he asked me a number of questions, including whether i suffered from depression, and if i would take anti-depressants; i told him that i am diagnosed with anxiety, not depression, and would not take drugs for something i have no diagnosis for, and little suspicion i suffer from. further, i felt the best treatment for the anxiety was access to the testosterone suppressant, given the totality of the situation. what the psychiatrist essentially told me was that i should get used to detransitioning, and while he would prescribe me medication to deal with it (an opiate, or an ssri), he would not do anything to prevent it. when i told him that i did not want to detransition, he became agitated, accused me of manipulating the system for my benefit, told me i was lying when i claimed i was episodic and suicidal and then discharged me without further concern, insisting it was my choice if i killed myself over the effects of detransitioning.
at that point, this was all too much to take, and i decided i would starve to death, on the spot; the psychiatrist demanded that i immediately leave the premises, and called the police back in when i refused.
when the police arrived, i told them that i would not leave, and they could do with me what they will, as i no longer had any will to live. the police repeated the accusation that i was lying, as presented by the psychiatrist, and insisted that i was trespassing after having been discharged, and i could go die somewhere else if i insisted. at one point, i was told point blank by security, who was called into help remove me, that they didn't care if i killed myself or not.
some combination of security & the police (four large men, all and all) then handcuffed me and dragged me out of the er, yelling and screaming, and brought me to a holding cell in the windsor police station, where i was ticketed with trespassing on hospital property and released within a few hours. the ticket says 8:53 pm; i made it home a little after 00:00 on september 1st. the sergeant seemed pontius-like; he didn't think i did anything wrong, but felt the obligation to obey the requests of hospital staff.
as it was now after midnight, and i was still without access to the testosterone suppressors, and consequently still suicidal, i felt little choice but to make sure i had a sweater this time and go back to the hospital, to try again. what else was i going to do? what i hoped was that the staff had turned over, and i would be able to get a second opinion.
while the staff had indeed turned over - there was a new security guard, and new nurses at triage - i did not make it in to see a doctor the second time. instead, the police were called in to remove me from the waiting room before i was allowed to see a doctor. when i told the police i was suicidal, they seemed to take me more seriously than the doctors did, but they ultimately had to defer to the diagnosis that i was making it all up, and lying to manipulate them into prescribing, forcing me into making the choice to have to actually make an attempt to kill myself to prove the psychiatrist wrong, rather than have them react rationally to try to prevent me from actually doing that. i was arrested a second time at about 3:00 on the morning of the 1st and held in a cell until 8:30 am, when i was ticketed a second time and told i'd be charged criminally if i went back to the er, presumably leaving me to my own devices to die on the street.
while i intended to go back to the er, i did not doubt that they would arrest me a third time if walked right back in, so i decided to try a different approach; my family doctor was now open, as it was the morning of the next day, so i walked to his office and presented myself to reception, who told me he was not in the office. i told the receptionist that i would not leave as i had no other options surrounding existence, and asked her to make a decision to either call an ambulance to take me to the er (would they arrest me if i came in in an ambulance called by a physician's office?) or call the police to have me removed. the receptionist refused to make that choice, as she was not a doctor, and suggested i ask a walk-in clinic to make the choice instead. i decided that this was more likely to get me to the hospital in an ambulance, which was the choice i wanted made, and went to the closest clinic - which was closed, due to the pandemic. i tried a few more, and they were all closed as well. so, i decided to go home and make some calls to see what the best way to get into the hospital was, or maybe to try the other er campus (the met campus) in town. i first sent a fax to the windsor hospital when i got home, and then called my pharmacy to inquire as to the price of a very small supply - as i had now been off suppressors entirely for nearly 36 hours, and was starting to feel the effects. if i could buy a week's worth, it could prolong my life until i could convince somebody to prescribe...
thankfully, i got some empathy from the pharmacist, who fronted me a month, and that ended the crises for that time. it remains to be seen if i can either quickly have the surgery i need (which is now the priority) or find an appropriate doctor to overprescribe until i can.
while i take some responsibility for user error, as it is, the reaction by the security staff, the initial doctor and then the psychiatrist were outrageous, and there is little doubt in my mind that i would have been treated differently if i were a ciswoman seeking comparable treatment. neither the psychiatrist nor the doctor accepted my stress disorder as real or saw hormone replacement as an acceptable outcome - they both wanted to treat me as a drug addict, and ultimately prescribe me drugs for depression, instead (would they receive royalties for that?). this refusal to accept the premise of gender dysphoria as an existing condition at all, and clear insistence that i accept detransition instead, was a blatant demonstration of bias and an overt example of discrimination.
it could be many years before i'm able to approach the health care system in the same way again, if i ever can at all.
======
well, i was threatened with arrest three times and arrested twice for the crime of presenting myself to the health care system under extreme duress in the middle of a suicidal episode, and accused of lying about it by two doctors in order to manipulate the system, as a welfare recipient. i then spent roughly eight hours in a holding cell, instead of receiving medical care. this has severely shaken my faith in the health care system, and left me unclear as to how to react the next time that i suffer from my stress disorder, to the point that i have suicidal thoughts. will i be told i'm lying and arrested? put in jail? sent to county? i feel like i've been barred from receiving care, due to being transgendered. it's deeply traumatic, but they'll just tell me i'm lying if i push the point. while the past cannot be undone, and i will always live with the trauma of what happened, i feel that some kind of lesson needs to be learned, and some kind of changes need to be made. further, i feel that i should be compensated for what i went through.
=====
i'll write a first person blog narrative tonight or in the morning.
========
I feel it's necessary to produce some background information. That is, I'm going to tell you the whole story...
I am a male to female transgendered person that has been on hormones for most of the last twenty years and checks levels roughly once a year. I also have a diagnosed stress disorder; initially i was diagnosed with ptsd, which was later altered to social anxiety disorder, but the differences between these things are not entirely clear. what is clear is that i suffer from stress and anxiety in profound enough ways that i am considered to be unable to work, and currently live on odsp. Unfortunately, I have been noticing that my testosterone levels have been creeping up over the last several years due to the onset of tolerance to the testosterone-suppressing medication (cyproterone acetate), which has been decreasing the efficacy of the estrogen (the feminizing hormone) and having a general masculinizing effect that i've been taking steps to try to undo. In addressing this concern, i've run up against the problem of already being prescribed a high level of testosterone suppressors, and needing to take some other kind of approach to get testosterone levels down to full suppression.
It was decided at my 2017 appointment that, because i was already taking such a high dosage of cyproterone in the context of gender transition, it would be better to have my testicles removed than to try to increase the dosage; while the drug is considered clinically safe at relatively high dosages, and i still had a ways to go before concerns became relevant, if i were to continue to increase my dosage of this medication indefinitely, i'd eventually run up against the potential of damaging my organs, like my liver. it was just time to take the next step in transition, which is removing the source of bodily testosterone, allowing for a reduction of a drug that can have longterm consequences, rather than increase it at the potential of eventual harm, one day.
I saw a urologist in 2017, but he refused to remove my testicles as an elective surgery for what seemed to be religious reasons. While i considered launching a claim at that time, i was in a conflict with my landlord over second hand smoke (i had recently quit smoking) that preoccupied my time, and i ended up with little choice but to put the process off. it wasn't until my 2019 appointment that we made a more serious attempt to have the testicles removed, but when i returned for my 2020 appointment, i learned that the funding request got lost in the office (i had called several times to ask for the status, and was told in error that it was in process).
I also learned at the 2020 appointment, which was at the beginning of june of this year, that my testosterone levels had doubled over the last year, which was consistent with what i was feeling. Given the realities of elective surgery around the pandemic, and the fact that my funding request had been lost, i found myself in a crisis point and suggested that the dosage of cyproterone acetate be increased to prevent the onset of further remasculinization. My doctor instead suggested i try spironolactone if i was unhappy with the cyproterone, and i accepted a prescription, but when i got home and did research into it, i learned that (1) the spiro is less effective than the cyproterone (so switching didn't make sense) and (2) the spiro has more severe complications at lower dosages, indicating that it would make more sense to double my dosage of cyproterone, if what i was concerned about was primarily the safety of the drug. i also double checked that my new dosage was safe by checking the data sheet for it, and learned that i was moving from 33% to 66% of the maximum safe dosage. so, i cancelled the new prescription and sent a fax to my family doctor to double the rx of the initial prescription. as i was confident in my own research, i just merely assumed he would act upon my request, and went ahead and started doubling up, assuming that the new rx would be available for me on my next renewal.
however, when i went to renew, i found that the doctor had faxed back the initial rx for the dosage i was previously on, without explanation. i assumed this was an error. so, i asked the pharmacy to fax back a request for a doubling of the rx a second time, and continued with the increased dosage. i also received a letter in july, indicating that my funding request for testicular removal had been granted; by that time, however, i'd already increased the dosage and decided to stick with it until i could see the doctor next. this carried forwards until the end of august, when my rx ran out and i tried again - with the same result. i took my last cyproterone dosage at 00:00 on august 31st; i needed to find another dosage by noon.
on the evening of the 30th, my pharmacy informed me that, while my rx was still valid, i would no longer be able to bill my insurance company for it because i'd already used up the rx until mid october. i would either need to pay out of pocket (an impossibility, considering my disability status) or ask the doctor to double the rx, to conform to what i'd been taking since early june. worse, my appointment with my family doctor had been postponed at this point, apparently because he was out of the office until mid-september, so i would be unable to speak with him directly.
the pharmacy sent another request on the morning of the 31st, and received back exactly the same response, confirming the initial rx.
baffled by this, i went into the dr's office and spoke with a doctor that was covering for him, who told me that the reason they kept sending back the initial dosage was that there were treatment guidelines that would not allow for a dosage beyond what i was taking. that is, i was already maxxed out on the cyproterone. i explained the situation to him, but he told me his hands were tied - he was *unable* to increase the dosage without exposing himself to liability, and would not do so. while he agreed that the dosage i requested was technically safe in the short term, he insisted it should only be prescribed to prostate cancer patients, and was not moved by my insistence that it was short term, until i could have my testicles removed, as a cancer patient might. he told me i'd have to pay out of pocket, knowing i could not.
so, faced without options, and feeling suicidal, i took myself to the er to explain the scenario - after twenty years of being female-identifying, that is essentially my entire waking life, i was forced with the inevitability of imminent detransition, without there being anything i could do about it. while i did not want to kill myself, i was fully cognizant that the effects of remasculinization would be too much for me to bear, and that i needed immediate intervention to prevent myself from falling into a downward spiral of depression that would have no conceivable endpoint besides me taking my own life. this was a very stressful realization; as mentioned, i suffer from a stress disorder, so an episode of some sort was inevitable, and the er was the right place for me to be while it was happening.
while waiting in the emergency room at the ouelette campus of the windsor hospital, i found myself badly triggered by the temperature. i was wearing a tight-fitting pink tshirt and a pair of stretchy jeans; i would have needed a winter jacket and a toque to feel comfortable in the temperature in the waiting room. while my inability to climatize to even the slightest amount of air conditioning is a known condition for me, i was not able to prevent myself from becoming episodic, and found myself engaging in erratic behaviour to try to warm up - running back and forth across the er room, running on the spot, swaying side to side, and sort of bicycling in motion while sitting in the chair. this attracted the attention of security, who demanded i stop, and this is where the complaint begins.
while this behaviour may have been slightly annoying, it was not threatening to the people around me, and i felt that preventing myself from falling ill due to the cold - something that i know from experience was of serious concern - was of greater importance than stopping some of the other patients from feeling annoyed. i know that i've been in er rooms where patients were experiencing far more annoying symptoms, due to schizophrenia or even mental retardation, than i was; dealing with people having mental breakdowns in whatever capacity is a part of the experience of going to the er, and they'd just have to suffer the minor inconvenience, which is all that it was.
the security guard, however, took it upon himself to get very aggressive with me at this point. first, he asked triage to discharge me without being seen by a doctor, which was granted by the nurse - who i had told moments earlier i was suicidal and episodic. so, i need to get that point across: i told the nurse that i suffered from anxiety and was at the er because i was suicidal and episodic, and she discharged me for being episodic. so, i was asked to leave for displaying the behaviour that brought me to the er in the first place.
rather than leave on request, i cited the canada health act and insisted i had the right to see a doctor when suicidal under stress from anxiety. the security guard on duty, who i later learned was named ryan, denied the universality clause in the canada health act and called the police to remove me from the property instead.
initially, the police attempted to remove me by force, but when i resisted they realized that i was having a mental health episode and relented. after all, when the police are faced with an individual in a mental health crisis, what they do is bring them to the hospital, which is where i already was. after some discussion and debate that i only vaguely remember due to being episodic, but that i recall was at times very heated, the police left the premises. i was called into the hospital shortly after that, but what follows is a continuation of the initial point of conflict, as security clearly felt i should have been removed.
the nurse i saw after triage was the one bright point of all of this and rather kind, as she realized i was shivering due to the air conditioning and brought me some warm blankets. the episode left me both physically and mentally exhausted, and i found myself falling asleep once i got under them - first it was two blankets, and then it was three more, and i could have used another ten to really warm up. this just demonstrates the extent of the situation, and how cold i really was.
i spoke very briefly with a dr. attan, who told me he could prescribe me a dangerous opiate (which i refused), but would not take my request for cyproterone seriously. he told me he'd take a look at my file, and did not return to speak with me. instead, i was asked by the nurse to provide blood & urine samples, and then eventually falsely accused of being under the influence of methamphetamines (something i've never taken before in my life!).
so, to recap: a patient who is diagnosed with a stress order (myself) entered the hospital in a suicidal state due to fear of detransitioning, and when she demonstrated symptoms of that stress disorder due to a real fear of an inevitable traumatic event, she was refused serious treatment, offered opiates as a treatment option instead and then told she must be on methamphetamines, instead of acknowledging the trauma she was experiencing.
if that was not outrageous enough, a psychiatrist (who's name i did not pick up) then appeared to try to talk me through the meth addiction. he asked me a number of questions, including whether i suffered from depression, and if i would take anti-depressants; i told him that i am diagnosed with anxiety, not depression, and would not take drugs for something i have no diagnosis for, and little suspicion i suffer from. further, i felt the best treatment for the anxiety was access to the testosterone suppressant, given the totality of the situation. what the psychiatrist essentially told me was that i should get used to detransitioning, and while he would prescribe me medication to deal with it (an opiate, or an ssri), he would not do anything to prevent it. when i told him that i did not want to detransition, he became agitated, accused me of manipulating the system for my benefit, told me i was lying when i claimed i was episodic and suicidal and then discharged me without further concern, insisting it was my choice if i killed myself over the effects of detransitioning.
at that point, this was all too much to take, and i decided i would starve to death, on the spot; the psychiatrist demanded that i immediately leave the premises, and called the police back in when i refused.
when the police arrived, i told them that i would not leave, and they could do with me what they will, as i no longer had any will to live. the police repeated the accusation that i was lying, as presented by the psychiatrist, and insisted that i was trespassing after having been discharged, and i could go die somewhere else if i insisted. at one point, i was told point blank by security, who was called into help remove me, that they didn't care if i killed myself or not.
some combination of security & the police (four large men, all and all) then handcuffed me and dragged me out of the er, yelling and screaming, and brought me to a holding cell in the windsor police station, where i was ticketed with trespassing on hospital property and released within a few hours. the ticket says 8:53 pm; i made it home a little after 00:00 on september 1st. the sergeant seemed pontius-like; he didn't think i did anything wrong, but felt the obligation to obey the requests of hospital staff.
as it was now after midnight, and i was still without access to the testosterone suppressors, and consequently still suicidal, i felt little choice but to make sure i had a sweater this time and go back to the hospital, to try again. what else was i going to do? what i hoped was that the staff had turned over, and i would be able to get a second opinion.
while the staff had indeed turned over - there was a new security guard, and new nurses at triage - i did not make it in to see a doctor the second time. instead, the police were called in to remove me from the waiting room before i was allowed to see a doctor. when i told the police i was suicidal, they seemed to take me more seriously than the doctors did, but they ultimately had to defer to the diagnosis that i was making it all up, and lying to manipulate them into prescribing, forcing me into making the choice to have to actually make an attempt to kill myself to prove the psychiatrist wrong, rather than have them react rationally to try to prevent me from actually doing that. i was arrested a second time at about 3:00 on the morning of the 1st and held in a cell until 8:30 am, when i was ticketed a second time and told i'd be charged criminally if i went back to the er, presumably leaving me to my own devices to die on the street.
while i intended to go back to the er, i did not doubt that they would arrest me a third time if walked right back in, so i decided to try a different approach; my family doctor was now open, as it was the morning of the next day, so i walked to his office and presented myself to reception, who told me he was not in the office. i told the receptionist that i would not leave as i had no other options surrounding existence, and asked her to make a decision to either call an ambulance to take me to the er (would they arrest me if i came in in an ambulance called by a physician's office?) or call the police to have me removed. the receptionist refused to make that choice, as she was not a doctor, and suggested i ask a walk-in clinic to make the choice instead. i decided that this was more likely to get me to the hospital in an ambulance, which was the choice i wanted made, and went to the closest clinic - which was closed, due to the pandemic. i tried a few more, and they were all closed as well. so, i decided to go home and make some calls to see what the best way to get into the hospital was, or maybe to try the other er campus (the met campus) in town. i first sent a fax to the windsor hospital when i got home, and then called my pharmacy to inquire as to the price of a very small supply - as i had now been off suppressors entirely for nearly 36 hours, and was starting to feel the effects. if i could buy a week's worth, it could prolong my life until i could convince somebody to prescribe...
thankfully, i got some empathy from the pharmacist, who fronted me a month, and that ended the crises for that time. it remains to be seen if i can either quickly have the surgery i need (which is now the priority) or find an appropriate doctor to overprescribe until i can.
while i take some responsibility for user error, as it is, the reaction by the security staff, the initial doctor and then the psychiatrist were outrageous, and there is little doubt in my mind that i would have been treated differently if i were a ciswoman seeking comparable treatment. neither the psychiatrist nor the doctor accepted my stress disorder as real or saw hormone replacement as an acceptable outcome - they both wanted to treat me as a drug addict, and ultimately prescribe me drugs for depression, instead (would they receive royalties for that?). this refusal to accept the premise of gender dysphoria as an existing condition at all, and clear insistence that i accept detransition instead, was a blatant demonstration of bias and an overt example of discrimination.
it could be many years before i'm able to approach the health care system in the same way again, if i ever can at all.
======
well, i was threatened with arrest three times and arrested twice for the crime of presenting myself to the health care system under extreme duress in the middle of a suicidal episode, and accused of lying about it by two doctors in order to manipulate the system, as a welfare recipient. i then spent roughly eight hours in a holding cell, instead of receiving medical care. this has severely shaken my faith in the health care system, and left me unclear as to how to react the next time that i suffer from my stress disorder, to the point that i have suicidal thoughts. will i be told i'm lying and arrested? put in jail? sent to county? i feel like i've been barred from receiving care, due to being transgendered. it's deeply traumatic, but they'll just tell me i'm lying if i push the point. while the past cannot be undone, and i will always live with the trauma of what happened, i feel that some kind of lesson needs to be learned, and some kind of changes need to be made. further, i feel that i should be compensated for what i went through.
=====
again: i'm not going to be doing in depth polling analyses this cycle.
but, is biden really competitive in states like arizona and georgia, all of a sudden?
what i'm going to say is this: not only is it early, but the quality of the polling at this point is fairly poor. i'm not going to make a sophomoric argument about "reverting to the mean", and you should mostly throw away articles that are making that argument, as it isn't really applicable to popular opinion, in general. humans don't obey physical laws like that; we can get up and do whatever we want, there's really no reason to think we're going to revert to anything, in any scenario, at all. but, the polls we're getting at the moment are internet polls, or fox news polls, or polls that were bought and paid for by the parties, themselves.
that doesn't mean they're wrong, exactly.
it just means that you should have very low confidence in them, especially when they make very little sense.
if biden is going to win arizona, he's going to have to do exceedingly well with latinos, and there's little reason to take that idea seriously, given that he was deputy deporter-in-chief. he did terribly with them in the primaries. it's hard to believe that latin-speakers on the border are going to see this election as offering much of a substantive choice. so, it's a very, very tall order.
and, you could say the same thing about his chances in texas. i'm also going to throw a wrench in that argument - if biden does exceedingly poorly with apathetic latinos, who may also find themselves up against even more serious restrictions in their ability to actually vote than usual this cycle, we could see some surprises in some states around arizona that have leaned democratic recently, namely nevada, new mexico and colorado, which at the least may be a little closer than expected.
it's not that targeting latinos in this region is a bad strategy; to the contrary, i'd recommend it. and, i've been vocal about the need to build some kind of working class coalition between migrant workers in the south and factory workers in the north, which is what nafta was designed to prevent. the problem is biden; the blacks like him, but the hispanics do not, and the party should be focusing on damage control and holding what they have this cycle, not pretending that biden can win arizona or texas. a different candidate could potentially be competitive this cycle, but not one with the baggage in the migrant community that biden has.
sadly, this is a blown opportunity, as you could have run just about anything against trump on the border and beat him in the latino community.....except biden. i would expect low turnout, in the end, and trump to hold those states and do better than expected in the ones around them....
and, what about georgia? the carolinas? florida?
again: much of the polling is low quality, and the polling that is better quality seems to suggest that it's not close enough for biden to overpower the systemic biases that exist in these states, that make it difficult for blacks, specifically, to vote. if the polling in georgia is a toss-up, that's not good enough - he needs to be clearly ahead, outside of the margins, or voter suppression will hand the win to the republicans, across the board. hispanics in florida also tend to lean republican anyways, and i wouldn't expect biden to be very appealing to them, either. if biden is going to win florida, he's going to do it by sweeping retirees, who appear to be dying in large numbers. i don't seriously think any of these regions are in play.
i understand that the party wants to find some other way to win besides winning in the upper midwest, but biden is pretty much the worst candidate imaginable if you're trying to win hispanics, and while he is winning blacks rather comfortably, the margins are not just lower than obama's, but lower than clinton's too. it's not enough to flip anything.
he has to get white liberals out to vote to actually tip - and that's as true in georgia as it is in michigan. they're the demographic that was most important in 2018, they're what actually won biden the primary and they're the demographic that is most important, now, too.
...whether you like it or not.
we'll see if that changes in 2022 or 2024, but if it does, it doesn't help biden win just right now.
but, is biden really competitive in states like arizona and georgia, all of a sudden?
what i'm going to say is this: not only is it early, but the quality of the polling at this point is fairly poor. i'm not going to make a sophomoric argument about "reverting to the mean", and you should mostly throw away articles that are making that argument, as it isn't really applicable to popular opinion, in general. humans don't obey physical laws like that; we can get up and do whatever we want, there's really no reason to think we're going to revert to anything, in any scenario, at all. but, the polls we're getting at the moment are internet polls, or fox news polls, or polls that were bought and paid for by the parties, themselves.
that doesn't mean they're wrong, exactly.
it just means that you should have very low confidence in them, especially when they make very little sense.
if biden is going to win arizona, he's going to have to do exceedingly well with latinos, and there's little reason to take that idea seriously, given that he was deputy deporter-in-chief. he did terribly with them in the primaries. it's hard to believe that latin-speakers on the border are going to see this election as offering much of a substantive choice. so, it's a very, very tall order.
and, you could say the same thing about his chances in texas. i'm also going to throw a wrench in that argument - if biden does exceedingly poorly with apathetic latinos, who may also find themselves up against even more serious restrictions in their ability to actually vote than usual this cycle, we could see some surprises in some states around arizona that have leaned democratic recently, namely nevada, new mexico and colorado, which at the least may be a little closer than expected.
it's not that targeting latinos in this region is a bad strategy; to the contrary, i'd recommend it. and, i've been vocal about the need to build some kind of working class coalition between migrant workers in the south and factory workers in the north, which is what nafta was designed to prevent. the problem is biden; the blacks like him, but the hispanics do not, and the party should be focusing on damage control and holding what they have this cycle, not pretending that biden can win arizona or texas. a different candidate could potentially be competitive this cycle, but not one with the baggage in the migrant community that biden has.
sadly, this is a blown opportunity, as you could have run just about anything against trump on the border and beat him in the latino community.....except biden. i would expect low turnout, in the end, and trump to hold those states and do better than expected in the ones around them....
and, what about georgia? the carolinas? florida?
again: much of the polling is low quality, and the polling that is better quality seems to suggest that it's not close enough for biden to overpower the systemic biases that exist in these states, that make it difficult for blacks, specifically, to vote. if the polling in georgia is a toss-up, that's not good enough - he needs to be clearly ahead, outside of the margins, or voter suppression will hand the win to the republicans, across the board. hispanics in florida also tend to lean republican anyways, and i wouldn't expect biden to be very appealing to them, either. if biden is going to win florida, he's going to do it by sweeping retirees, who appear to be dying in large numbers. i don't seriously think any of these regions are in play.
i understand that the party wants to find some other way to win besides winning in the upper midwest, but biden is pretty much the worst candidate imaginable if you're trying to win hispanics, and while he is winning blacks rather comfortably, the margins are not just lower than obama's, but lower than clinton's too. it's not enough to flip anything.
he has to get white liberals out to vote to actually tip - and that's as true in georgia as it is in michigan. they're the demographic that was most important in 2018, they're what actually won biden the primary and they're the demographic that is most important, now, too.
...whether you like it or not.
we'll see if that changes in 2022 or 2024, but if it does, it doesn't help biden win just right now.
o, i called at exactly 13:00 and let it ring almost 20 times before the line disconnected. did you hear it ring?
you mentioned we'll figure something out. ok. these are the facts:
1) there's no way to reach me directly over the phone.
2) i can call out in theory, but can't reach you at this exact # for some unknown reason.
3) while i would really like a date for an appointment to be clarified, i am comfortable waiting for a bit until in-person appointments resume. i was previously under the impression that dr. ===== could do something for me that i now understand he cannot.
i am not a mask wearer (and i think the statistics are indicating that they are not working very well, anyways, given that people are not trained to use them properly. even the politicians on tv take the masks off with their bare hands and put them in their pockets, defeating the point. it's a symbolic thing, really, that is all. and, i'm reminded of the image of a mutually masked kamala harris and joe biden lifting their hands up into the air together, as a symbolic demonstration of how mask use can lead to overconfidence in self-defeating ways), but i am essentially self-quarantining and have been for months. i haven't been anywhere except stores and hospitals since march. i'm pretty low risk, even as a silent spreader.
another idea would be to communicate over email or some kind of chat software. as you can see, i type a fair amount.
otherwise, we could perhaps just direct a request to dr. ===== to put me in to see an endocrinologist and/or a urologist that is willing to talk about over-prescribing (and i understand *now* that i am requesting an over-prescription that dr. ===== himself cannot prescribe). that as the first thing.
further, i could perhaps even call around myself and find somebody willing to do the operation. that was the second thing. this is a procedure that should only take ten minutes and doesn't even actually require a visit to a hospital, it's just that few doctors seem willing to actually do it. if i can get that scheduled soon, the medication issue resolves itself.
it would be very useful to me to have a concrete date in mind to firm both of these things up, but i'm otherwise flexible, and will take the initiative to do what i can on my own and fax the information to the office as it becomes available, given the continuing bizarre state of reality around us.
this o'toole guy actually seems to have this ditherish, gorbachevish veneer to him that is a potential comic gold mine.
listen: i wear a lot of hats, and it's clear i have a very silly court jester one in the pile.
and, i can see a good punchline from a great distance.
if i were the aging dauphin, i would not consider him a serious threat. the liberals could conceivably flip back a few seats they lost last time in places like downtown calgary, as this guy is not going to be seen well by westerners, either.
the liberals should be more concerned about their support on the left unravelling.
listen: i wear a lot of hats, and it's clear i have a very silly court jester one in the pile.
and, i can see a good punchline from a great distance.
if i were the aging dauphin, i would not consider him a serious threat. the liberals could conceivably flip back a few seats they lost last time in places like downtown calgary, as this guy is not going to be seen well by westerners, either.
the liberals should be more concerned about their support on the left unravelling.
hi.
jessica....
i'm sorry about the late response, but the last few days have been confusing.
this is of course an absurd way to communicate, but there is simply not a number you can reach me at. i just don't need a phone, so i don't want to pay for one.
and, i don't understand why calling your office just rings. it could be that there's no number, maybe? the number i give you is a voip box, which is different than the way i call out, which is over google voice, and is not connected to a number at all. i'm essentially calling you from my gmail address.
so, i'm happy to do a phone appointment in principle, and the date and time are fine, but you have to give me a number to call that actually connects or it's not going to work.
but, i have an idea, because i do suspect that when i call it is ultimately getting screened, and discarded as a telemarketer or something.
i will call you today from google voice at exactly 13:00. you will know it's me because i've told you ahead of time. it may say "unknown number" or some other weird thing, but that's because it's over the internet, and there is actually no number to come up.
if that connects, we can talk about what to do when it does.
if it does not, the only way this can work is if you give me a number to call.
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